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I
PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.
During the seven years which have elapsed since the pub-
lication in 1868 of the first edition of this Work, I have
continued to atiend to the same subjects, as far as lay in my
jDOwer; and I have thus accumulated a large body of addi-
tional facts, chiefly through the kindness of many corie-
spondents. Of these tacts 1 have been able here to use only
those which seemed to me the more important. I have
omitted some statements, and corrected some errors, the dis-
covery of which I owe to my reviewers. Many additional
references have been given. The eleventh chapter, and that
on Pan genesis, are those which have been most altered, parts
having been re-modelled ; but I will give a list of the more
important alterations for the sake of those who may possess
the first edition of this book.
contents
INTRODUCTION
Pago8 1-14
CHAPTEIi I.
DOMESTIC DOGS AND CATS.
iiNCIENT VARIETIES OF THE DOG — RESEMBLANCE OF DOMESTIC DOGS
IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES TO NATIVE CANINE SPECIES — ANIMALS NOT
ACQUAINTED WITH aiAN AT FIRST FEARLESS DOGS RESEMBLING
WOLVES AND JACKALS — HABIT OF BARKING ACQUIRED AND LOST
— FERAL DOGS — TAN-COLOURED EYE-SPOTS — PERIOD OF GESTATION
OFFENSIVE ODOUR — FERTILITY OF THE RACES WHEN CROSSED —
DIFFERENCES IN THE SEVERAL RACES IN PART DUE TO DESCENT
FROM DISTINCT SPECIES — DIFFERENCES IN THE SKULL AND TEETH
— DIFFERENCES IN THE BODY, IN CONSTITUTION — FEW IMPORTANT
DIFFERENCES HAVE BEEN FIXED BY SELECTION — DIRECT ACTION
OF CLIMATE — WATER-DOGS WITH PALMATED FEET — HISTORY OF
THE CHANGES WHICH CERTAIN ENGLISH RACES OF THE DOG HAVE
' GRADUALLY UNDERGONE THROUGH SELECTION — EXTINCTION OF THE
LESS IMPROVED SUB-BREEDS. |
CATS, CROSSED WHTH SEVERAL SPECIES— DIFFERENT BREEDS FOUND
ONLY IN SEPARATED COUNTRIES — DIRECT EFFECTS OF THE
CONDITIONS OF LIFE — FERAL CATS — INDIVIDUAL VARIABI-
LITY 15-50
CHAPTER II.
HORSES AND ASSES.
HORSE. — DIFFERENCES IN THE BREEDS — INDIVIDUAL VARIAEILIT?
OF — DIRECT EFFECTS OF THE CONDITIONS OF LIFE — CAN WITHSTAND
MUCH COLD — BREEDS MUCH MODIFIED BY SELECTION— COLOURS OF
CONTENTS,
v\
THE HOUSE — DAPPLING — DARK STRIPES ON THE SPINE, LEfiS,
SHOULDERS, AND FOREHEAD — DUN-COLOURED HORSES MOST FRE-
QUENTLY STRIPED— STRIPES PROBABLY DUE TO REVERSION TO TUB
PRIMITIVE STATE OF THE HORSE.
A ES. — BREEDS OF— COLOUR OF— LEG AND SHOULDER-STRIPES—
SHOULDER-STRIPES SO.METIMES ABSENT, SOMETIMES FORKED.
Pages 51-07
CHAPTER III.
PIGS — CATTLE — SHEEP— GOATS.
PIGS BELONG TO TWO DISTINCT TYPES, SUS SCROFA AND INDICES —
TORFSCHWEIN JAPAN PIGS — FERTILITY OF CROSSED PIGS CHANGES
IN THE SKULL OF THE HIGHLY CULTIVATED RACES — CONVERGENCE
OF CHARACTER — GESTATION— SOLID-HOOFED SWINE — CURIOUS AP-
PENDAGES TO THE JAWS — DECREASE IN SIZE OF THE TUSKS —
YOIJnG PIGS LONGITUDINALLY STRIPED — FERAL PIGS— CROSSED
BREEDS.
CA'I'TLE. — ZEBU A DISTINCT SPECIES — EUROPEAN CATTLE PROBABLY
DESCENDED FROM THREE WILD P'ORMS — ALL THE RACES NOW
FERTILE TOGETHER— BRITISH PARK CATTLE— ON THE COLOUR OF
THE ABORIGINAL SPECIES— CONSTITUTIONAL DIFFERENCES — SOUTH
AFRICAN RACES — SOUTH AMERICAN RACES— NIATA CATTLE — ORIGIN
OF THE VARIOUS RACES OF CATTLE.
SHKEP. — ^^REMAEKABLE RACES OF — VARIATIONS ATTACHED TO THE
MALE SEX — ADAPTATIONS TO VARIOUS CONDITIONS — GESTATION OF
— CHANGES IN THE WOOL — SEMI-MONSTROUS BREEDS.
GOATS.— REMARKABLE VARIATIONS OF G8-106
CHAPTEE lY.
DOMESTIC KABBITS.
RABBITS DESCENDED FROM THE COMMON WILD RABBIT —
ANCIENT DOMESTICATION ANCIENT SELECTION — LARGE LOP-EARED
RABBITS — VARIOUS BREEDS — FLUCTUATING CHARACTERS — ORIGIN
OF THE HIMALAYAN BREED— CURIOUS CASE OF INHERITANCE —
FERAL RABBITS IN JAMAICA AND THE FALKLAND ISLANDS — RORTO
SANTO FERAL RABBITS — OSTEOLOGICAL CHARACTERS — SKm.L-
CONTENTS,
Vll
.SKULL OF HALF-LOP RABBITS VARIATIONS IN THE SKULL
ANALAGOUS TO DIFFERENCES IN DIFFERENT SPECIES OF HARES —
VERTEBRA STERKUM SCAPULA — EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE ON
THE PROPORTIONS OF THE LIMBS AND BODY CAPACITY OF THE
SKULL AND REDUCED SIZE OF THE BRAIN SUMMARY ON THE
MODIFICATIONS OF DOMESTICATED RABBITS .. .. Pages 107-130
CHAPTER V.
DOMESTIC PIGEONS.
F:NUMERATI0N and description of THE SEVERAL BREEDS — INDIVIDUAL
VARIABILITY — VARIATIONS OF A REMARKABLE NATURE— OSTEO-
LOGICAL CHARACTERS : SKULL, LOWER JAW, NUMBER OF VERTEBPwE
— CORRELATION OF GROWTH : TONGUE WITH BEAK ; EYELIDS AND
NOSTRILS WITH WATTLED SKIN — NUMBER OF WING-FEATHERS AND
LENGTH OF WING COLOUR AND DOWN WEBBED AND FEATHERED
FEET— ON THE EFFECTS OF DISUSE — LENGTH OF FEET IN CORRE-
LATION WITH LENGTH OF -BEAK — LENGTH OF STERNUM, SCAPULA,
AND FURCULUM — LENGTH OF WINGS — SUMMARY ON THE POINTS
OF DIFFERENCE IN THE SEVERAL BREEDS 137-188
CHAPTER VI.
PIGEONS — continued.
ON THE ABORIGINAL PARENT-STOCK OF THE SEVERAL DOMESTIC RACES
— HABITS OF LIFE — WILD RACES OF THE ROCK-PIGEON — DOVECOT-
PIGEONS — PROOFS OF THE DESCENT OF THE SEVERAL RACES FROM
COLUMBA LI VIA — FERTILITY OF THE RACES WHEN CROSSED — RE-
VERSION TO THE PLUMAGE OF THE WILD ROCK-PIGEON — CIRCUM-
STANCES FAVOURABLE TO THE FORMATION OF THE RACES— AN-
TIQUITY AND HISTORY OF THE PRINCIPAL RACES — MANNER OF
THEIR FORMATION — SELECTION — UNCONSCIOUS SELECTION — CARE
TAKEN BY FANCIERS IN SELECTING THEIR BIRDS —SLIG HTLY DIF-
FERENT STRAINS GRADUALLY CHANGE INTO WELL-MARKED BREEDS
EXTINCTION OF INTERMEDIATE FORMS — CERTAIN BREEDS REMAIN
PERMANENT, WHILST OTHERS CHANGE— SUMMARY . . ., 18D-23H
CONTENTS.
nil
CHAPTER VTL
FOWJ.S.
BUIEF DESCRirnONS OF THE CHIEF BREEDS— ARGUMENTS IN FA YOU U
OF THEIR DESCENT FROM SEVERAL SPECIES — ARGUMENTS IN FAVOi li
OF ALL THE BREEDS HAVING DESCENDED FROM GALLUS BANK.I\ A
— REVERSION TO THE PARENT-STOCK IN COLOUR — ANALOGOUS
VARIATIONS — ANCIENT HISTORY OF THE FOWL — EXTERNAL DIF-
FERENCES BETWEEN THE SEVERAL BREEDS — EGGS — CHICKENS —
SECONDARY SEXUAL CHARACTERS — WING- AND TAIL- FEATHERS,
VOICE, DISPOSITION, ETC. — OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFERENCES IN THE
SKULL, VERTEBR.E, ETC. — EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE ON CERTAIN
PARTS— CORRELATION OF GROWTH Pages 236-280
CHAPTEK VIII.
DUCK — GOOSE — PEACOCK — TURKEY — GUINEA-FOWL —
CANARY-BIRD — GOLD-FISH — HIVE-BEES — SILK-MOTHS.
DUCKS, SEVERAL BREEDS OF — PROGRESS OF DOMESTICATION— ORIGIN
OF FROM THE COMMON WILD-DUCK — DIFFERENCES IN THE DIF-
■ FERENT BREEDS— OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFERENCES— EFFECTS OF USE
AND DISUSE ON THE LIMB-BONES.
GOOSE, ANCIENTLY DOMESTICATED — LITTLE VARIATION OF SEBAS-
TOPOL BREED. •
PEACOCK, ORIGIN OF BLACK-SHOULDERED BREED.
TQPiKEY, BREEDS OF — CROSSED WITH THE UNITED STATES SPECIES
— EFFECTS OF CLIMATE ON.
GUINEA-FOWL, CANARY-BIRD, GOLD-FISH, HIVE-BEP.
SILK-MOTH"^, SPECIES and breeds of — anciently domesticated
—CARE IN THEIR SELECTION — DIFFERENCES IN THE DIFFERENT
RACES — IN THE EGG, CATERPILLAR, AND COCOON STATES— INHERIT-
ANCE OF CHARACTERS IMPERFECT WINGS -LOST INSTINCTS — CORRE-
lATED CHARACTERS ' 2il0-321
CONTENTS.
is
CHAPTEE IX.
CULTIVATED PLANTS I CEREAL AND CULINARY PLANTS.
PllELIMlNARY REMARKS on the number and parentage of
CULTIVATED PLANTS — FIRST STEPS IN CULTIVATION — GEOGRAPHICAL
DISTRIBUTION OF CULTIVATED PLANTS.
CEREAL! A. — doubts on the number of species. wheat:
VARIETIES OF — INDIVIDUAL VARIABILITY — CHANGED HABITS —
selection — ANCIENT HISTORY OF THE VARIETIES. MAIEE : GREAT
VARIATION OF — DIRECT ACTION OF CLIMATE ON.
CULINARY PLANTS. — cabbages : varieties of, in foliage and
STEMS, but not IN OTHER PARTS — PARENTAGE OF — OTHER SPECIES
OF BRASSICA. -PEAS: AMOUNT OF DIFFERENCE IN THE SEVERAL
KINDS, CHIEFLY IN THE PODS AND SEED — SOME VARIETIES CON-
STANT, SOME HIGHLY VARIABLE — DO NOT INTERCROSS. BEANS.
potatoes : NUMEROUS VARIETIES OF — DIFFER LITTLE EXCEPT
IN THE TUBERS — CHARACTERS INHERITED .. .. PagCS 322-351
CHAPTEE X.
PLANTS continued — fruits — ornamental trees —
FLOWERS.
FRUITS — GRAPES — VARY IN ODD AND TRIFLING PARTICULARS.
MULBERRY — THE ORANGE GROUP — SINGULAR RESULTS. FROM CROSS-
ING. PEACH AND NECTARINE — BUD- VARIATION — ANALOGOUS
VARIATION — RELATION TO THE ALMOND. APRICOT. PLUMS —
VARIATION IN THEIR STONES. CHERRIES— SINGULAR VARIETIES
OF. APPLE. PEAR. STRAWBERRY — INTERBLENDING OF THE
ORIGINAL FORMS. GOOSEBERRY — STEADY INCREASE IN SIZE OF
THE FRUIT — VARIETIES OF. WALNUT. NUT. CUCURBIT A-
CEOUS PLANTS — WONDERFUL VARIATION OF.
ORNAMENTAL TREES— their variation in degree and kind
—ASH-TREE — SCOTCH-FIR — HAWTHORN.
FLOWERS— MULTIPLE ORIGIN OF MANY KINDS — VARIATION IN CON-
STITUTIONAL PECULIARITIES — KIND OF VARIATION. ROSES —
SEVERAL SPECIES CULTIVATED. PANSY. DAHLIA. HYA-
CINTH— HISTORY AND VARIATION OP .. .. .. 352-396
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER XI.
ON BUD-VAEIATION, AND ON CERTAIN ANOMALOUS MODES
OF REPRODUCTION AND VARIATION.
BITD-VARIATION IN THE PEACH, PLUM, CHEERY, VINE, GOOSEBERRY,
CURRANT, AND BANANA, AS SHOWN BY THE MODIFIED FRUIT — IN
flowers: camellias, azaleas, chrysanthemums, roses, etc,
— on the running of the colour in carnations — bud-
variations IN leaves — VARIATIONS BY SUCKERS, TUBERS, AND
BULBS — ON THE BREAKING OF TULIPS — BUD-VARIATIONS GRADUATE
INTO CHANGES CONSEQUENT ON CHANGED CONDITIONS OF LIFE —
GRAFT-HYBRIDS — ON THE SEGREGATION OF THE PARENTAL CHARAC-
TERS IN SEMINAL HYBRIDS BY BUD-VARIATION — ON THE DIRECT
OR IMMEDIATE ACTION OF FOREIGN POLLEN ON THE MOTHER-
PLANT — ON THE EFFECTS OF A PREVIOUS IMPREGNATION ON THE
SUBSEQUENT OFFSPRING OF FEMALE ANIMALS — CONCLUSION - AND
SUMMARY Pages 397-444
CHAPTEK XII.
INHERITANCE.
ft’ONDERFUL NATURE OF INHERITANCE — PEDIGREES OF OUR DOMESTI-
CATED ANIMALS — INHERITANCE NOT DUE TO CHANCE — TRIFLING
CHARACTERS INHERITED — DISEASES INHERITED — PECULIARITIES IN
THE EYE INHERITED — DISEASES IN THE HORSE — LONGEVITY AND
VIGOUR — ASYMMETRICAL DEVIATIONS OF STRUCTURE POLYDAC-
TYLISM AND REGROWTH OF SUPERNUMERARY DIGITS AFTER AM-
PUTATION—CASES OF SEVERAL CHILDREN SIMILARLY AFFECTED
FROM NON- AFFECTED PARENTS — WEAK AND FLUCTUATING IN-
HERITANCE : IN WEEPING TREES, IN DWARFNESS, COLOUR OF FRUIT
AND FLOWERS — COLOUR OF HORSES — NON-INHERITANCE IN CERTAIN
CASES— INHERITANCE OF STRUCTURE AND HABITS OVERBORNE BY
HOSTILE CONDITIONS OF LIFE, BY INCESSANTLY RECURRING VARIA-
BILITY, AND BY REVERSION— CONCLUSION .. .. .. ‘115-J73
LIST OP ILLUSTRATIONS,
I FIG. litiC’S
1. Dun Devonshire Pony, with shoulder, spinal, and leg
STRIPES 59
I 2. Head of Japan or Masked Pig 73
3. Head of Wild Boar, and of “ Golden Days,” a pig
IL OF THE Yorkshire large breed .. .. 75
1 4. Old Irish Pig with jaw-appendages 79
11 5. Half lop Rabbit .. .. 112
lu 6. Skull of Wild Rabbit 122
H 7. Skull of large Lop-eared Rabbit 122
n 8. Part of Zygomatic Arch, showing the projecting end
If OF THE malar BONE OF THE AUDITORY MEATUS, OF
II Rabbits.. .. ' .. 123
) 9. Posterior end of Skull, showing the inter-parietal
I BONE, OF Rabbits .. .. 123
t 10. Occipital Foramen of Rabbits 123
; * 11. Skull of Halp-lop Rabbit 124
[ 12. Atlas Vertebra of Rabbits 126
13. Third Cervical Vertebra of Rabbits 127
14. Dorsal Vertebra, from sixth to tenth inclusive, of
Rabbits .. .. 128
15. Terminal Pone of Sternum of Rabbits 128
■ 16. Acromion of Scapula of Rabbits 129
17. The Rock-Pigeon, or Columba Livia 141
I 18. English Pouter 144
[ 19. English Carrier 147
20. English Barb • 152
, 21. English Fantail 154
I 22. African Owl 157
13. Short-faced English Tumbler .. 160
Xll
LIST OF ILLUSTEATIONS.
Pi.OS
24. Skulls of Pigeons, viewed laterally
25. Lower Jaws of Pigeons, seen from above
2G. Skull op Kunt, seen from above
27. Lateral view of Jaws of Pigeons ..
28. ScAPULiE OP Pigeons
29. Furcula of Pigeons
30. Spanish Fowl
31. Hamburgh Fowl
32. Polish Fowl
33. Occipital Foramen of the Skulls of Fowls
34. Skulls of Fowls, viewed from above, a little ob-
liquely
35. Longitudinal sections of Skulls of Fowls, viewed
laterally
36. Skull of Horned Fowl, viewed from above, a little
OBLIQUELY
37 Sixth Cervical Vertebras of Fowls, viewed laterally
38. Extremity of the Furcula of Fowls, viewed later-
ally
39. Skulls of Ducks, viewed laterally, reduced to two-
thirds OF the natural size
40. Cervical Vertebra of Ducks, of natural size ..
41. Pods of the Common Pea
42. Peach and Almond Stones, of natural size, viewed
edgeways
43. Plum Stones, of natural size, viewed laterally
174
174
176
176
238
239
240
274
275
281
282
297
298
347
358 i;
366 '
( “ii )
I
TABLE OF PRINCIPAL ADDITIONS AND
CORRECTIONS.
First
Second
Eilition.
VoL. L
Edition.
VOL. I.
Page
Page
84
35
Dr. Burt Wilder’s observations on the brains ol
different breeds of the Dog.
38
40
Degeneracy of Dogs imported into Guinea.
51
54
Difference in the number of the lumbar vertebra) in
the races or species of the Horse.
102
106
Hairy appendages to the throats of Goats.
162
170
Sexual differences in colour in the domestic Pigeon.
217
228
Movements like those of the Tumbler-pigeon,
caused by injury to the brain.
290
306
Additional facts with respect to the Black-shouldered
Peacock.
296
312
Ancient selection of Gold- fish in China.
314
332
Major Hallett’s ‘ Pedigree Wheat.’
326 _
345
The common radish descended from Raphanus raph-
anistrum.
374
398
Several additional cases of bud- variation given.
396
420
An abstract of all the cases recently published of
graft-hybrids in the potato, together with a gene-
ral summary on graft-hybridisation.
399
429
An erroneous statement with respect to the pollen
of the date-palm affecting the fruit of the Cham-
rerops omitted.
400
430
New cases of the direct action of pollen on the
mother-plant.
404
435
Additional and remarkable instances of the action
of the male parent on the future progeny of the
7ol. ip
female.
11
459
An erroneous statement corrected, with respect to
the regrowth of supernumerary digits after am-
putation.
( )
TABLE OF PIUNCIPAL ADDITIONS AND COIUtECTIOiNS.
{Continued.)
First
Second
Fdilion.
Voi,. 11.
hdilion.
VoL. i.
■
Page
I'age
28
467
Additional facts with respect to the inherited effects
of circumcision.
23
467
Dr, Browii-Sequard on the inherited effects of opera-
tions on the Guinea-pig.
24
469
Other cases of inherited mutilations.
Voi. II.
43
17
An additional case of reversion due to a cross.
72
48
Inheritance as limited hy sex.
105
83
Two varieties of maize which caimot be crossed.
120
99
Some additional facts on the advantages of cross-(‘^
breeding in animals. ^1
123
103
Discussion on the effects of close interbreeding inj
the case of man. 1^2
135
to
141
117 1
to \
122 J
Additional cases of plants sterile with pollen from
the same plant. b
149
131
Mr. Sclater on the infertility of animals under con- F
finement. p
152
134
The Aperea a distinct species from the Guinea-pig. i
230
215
Prof. Jager on hawks killing light-coloured pigeons. 1
273
262
Prof. Weismanu on the effects of isolation in the 1
development of species.
281
271
The direct action of the conditions of life in causing
variation.
317
309
Mr. Komanes on rudimentary parts.
324
316 )
1
to
to >
Some additional cases of correlated variability.
328
327 1
J
339 i
333
On Geoffroy St. Hilaire’s law of yoi pour sof.”
357
349 ]
The chapter on Pan genesis has been largely altered
to
to 1
and re-modelled; but the essential principles re-
404
1
399 J
main the same.
\
VARIATION OF ANIMALS AND PLANTS
UNDER DOMESTICATION.
INTRODUCTION.
The object of this work is not to describe all the many races
of animals which have been domesticated by man, and of
the plants which have been cultivated by him; even if I
possessed the requisite knowledge, so gigantic an undertaking
would be here superfluous. It is my intention to give under the
head of each species only such facts as I have been able to col-
lect or observe, showing the amount and nature of the changes
which animals and plants have undergone whilst under man’s
dominion, or which bear on the general principles of varia-
tion. In one case alone, namely in that of the domestic
pigeon, I will describe fully all the chief races, their history,
th'e^mount and nature of their differences, and the probable
steps by which the}’ have been formed. I have selected this
case, because, as we shall hereafter see, the materials are better
than in any other ; and one case fully described will in fact
illustrate all others. But I shall also describe domesticated
rabbits, fowls, and ducks, with considerable fulness.
The subjects discussed in this volume are so connected that
it is not a little difficult to decide how they can be best arranged.
I have determined in the first part to give, under the heads of
the various animals and plants, a large body of facts, some
of which may at first appear but little related to our subject,
and to devote the latter part to general discussions. When-
ever I have found it necessary to give numerous details, in
support of any proposition or conclusion, small type has been
2
INTRODUCTION.
used. The readei will, I think, find this plan a convenience^
for, if he does not doubt the conclusion or care about the
details, he can easily pass them over ; yet I may be permitted
to say that some of the discussions thus printed deserve
attention, at least from the professed naturalist.
It may be useful to those who have read nothing about
Katural Selection, if 1 here give a brief sketch of the whole
subject and of its bearing on the origin of species.^ This is
the more desirable, as it is impossible in the present work to
avoid many allusions to questions which will be fully discussed
in future volumes.
From a remote period, in all parts of the world, man has
subjected many animals and plants to domestication or culture.
Man has no power of altering the absolute conditions of life:
he cannot change the climate of any country ; he adds no new
element to the soil ; but he can remove an animal or plant
from one climate or soil to another, and give it food on which
it did not subsist in its natural state. It is an error to speak
of man “ tampering with nature ” and causing variability. If
a man drops a piece of iron into sulphuric acid, it cannot be
said strictly that he makes the sulphate of iron, he only
allows their elective affinities to come into play. If organic
beings liad not possessed an inherent tendency to vary, man
could have done nothing.^ He unintentionally exposes his
animals and plants to various conditions of life, and varia-
bility supervenes, which he cannot even prevent or checlc.
Consider the simple case of a plant which has been cultivated
during a long time in its native country, and which conse-
quently has not been subjected to any change of climate. It
has been protected to a certain extent from the competing
roots of plants of other kinds ; it has generally been grown in
manured soil ; but probably not richer than that of many an
1 To any one who has attentively
read my ‘ Origin of Species ’ this In-
troduction will be superfluous. As I
stated in that work that I should
soon publish the facts on which the
conclusions given in it were founded,
I here beg permission to remark that
the great delay in publishing this
first work has been caused by con-
tinued ill-health.
2 M. Pouchet has recently (‘ Plural-
ity of Races,’ Eng. Translat., 1864, p.
83, &c.) insisted that variation under
domestication throws no light on the
natural modification of species. I
cannot perceive the force of his argu-
ments, or, to speak more accurately,
of his assertions to this effect.
NATURAL SELECTION.
3
alluvial flat ; and lastly, it has been exposed to changes in its
conditions, being grown sometimes in one district and some-
times in another, in difterent soils. Under such circumstances,
scarcely a plant can be named, though cultivated in the rudest
manner, which has not given birth to several varieties. It can
hardly be maintained that during the many changes which this
earth has undergone, and during the natural jnigrations of
plants from one land or island to anothei-, tenanted by different
species, that such plants will not often have been subjected to
changes in their conditions analogous to those which almost
inevitably cause cultivated plants to vary. No doubt man
selects varying individuals, sows their seeds, and again selects
their varying offspring. But the initial variation on which
man works, and without which he can do nothing, is caused
by slight changes in the conditions of life, which must often
have occurred under nature. Man, therefore, may be said to
have been trying an experiment on a gigantic scale ; and it
is an experiment which nature during the long lapse of time
has incessantly tried. Hence it follows that the principles
of domestication are important for us. The main result
is that organic beings thus treated have varied largely,
and the variations have been inherited. This has ap-
parently been one chief cause of the belief long held by some
few naturalists that species in a state of nature undergo
change.
I shall in this volume treat, as fully as my materials permit,
the whole subject of variation under domestication. We may
thus hope to obtain some light, little though it be, on the
causes of variability, — on the laws which govern it, such as the
direct action of climate and food, the effects of use and disuse,
and of correlation of growth, — and on the amount of change to
which domesticated organisms are liable. We shall learn
something of the laws of inheritance, of the effects of crossing
different breeds, and on that sterility which often supervenes
when organic beings are . removed from their natural
conditions of life, and likewise when they are too closely
interbred. During this investigation we shall see that the
principle of Selection is highly important. Although man does
not cause variability and cannot even prevent it, he can select.
INTRODUCTION.
i
preserve, and aecnmnlate the variations given to him h}' the
hand of nature almost in any way which he chooses ; and
thus he can certainly produce a great result. Selection may
he folloAved either methodically and intentionally, or uncon-
sciously and unintentionally. Man may select and preserve
ca(;h successive A^ariation, with the distinct intention of im-
proving and altering a breed, in accordance with a precon-
oeived idea; and by thus adding up variations, often so
slight as to be imperceptible by an uneducated eye, he has
effected wonderful changes and improvements. It can, also,
be clearly shown that man, without any intention or thought
of improving the breed, by preserving in each successiA^e
generation the individuals which he prizes most, and by
destroying the worthless individuals, slowly, though surely,
induces great changes. As the will of man thus comes
into play, we can understand how it is that domesticated
breeds show adaptation to his Avants and pleasures. We
can further understand how it is that domestic races of
animals and cultivated races of plants often exhibit an
abnormal character, as compared with natural species ; for
they have been modified not for their own benefit, but foi
that of man.
In another work I shall discuss, if time and health permit,
the variability of organic beings in a state of nature ; namely,
the individual • differences presented by animals and plants,
and those slightly greater and generally inherited differences
which are ranked by naturalists as varieties or geographical
races. We shall see how difficult, or rather hoAv impossible
it often is, to distinguish betAveen races and sub-species, as
the less well-marked forms have sometimes been denominated ;
and again betAveen sub-species and true species. I shall
further attempt to show that it is the common and widely
ranging, or, as they may be called, the dominant species,
which most frequently A^ary ; and that it is the large and
flourishing genera which include the greatest number of
A^arying species. Varieties, as Ave shall see, may justly be
called incipient species.
But it may be urged, granting that organic beings in a state
of nature jDresent seme varieties, — that their organization is
NATUEAL SELECTION.
b
^ ill some slight degree plastic ; granting that many animals
and plants have varied greatly under domestication, and that
man by his power of selection has gone on accumulating such
variations until he has made strongly marked and firmly in-
herited races ; granting all this, how, it may be asked, have
species arisen in a state of nature ? The differences between
natural varieties are slight ; whereas the differences are con-
siderable between the species of the same genus, and great
between the species of distinct genera. How do these lesser
differences become augmented into the greater difference?
How do varieties, or as I have called them incipient species,
become converted into true and well-defined species ? How has
each new species been adapted to the surrounding physical con-
ditions, and to the other forms of life on which it in any way
depends ? We see on every side of us innumerable adapta-
tions and contrivances, which have justly excited the highest
admiration of every observer. There is, for instance, a fly
(Cecidomyia) ^ which deposits its eggs within the stamens
of a Scrophularia, and secretes a poison which produces a gall,
on which the larva feeds ; but there is another insect (Miso-
campus) which deposits its eggs within the body of the larva
within the gall, and is thus nourished by its living prey ; so
that here a hymenojDterous insect depends on a dipterous
ini,ect, and this depends on its power of producing a monstrous
growth iu a particular organ of a particular plant. So it is, in
a more or less plainly marlsed manner, in thousands and tens
of thousands of cases, with the lowest as well as with the highest
productions of nature.
This problem of the conversion of varieties into species, —
that is, the augmentation of the slight differences character-
istic of varieties into the greater differences characteristic of
species and genera, including the admirable adaptations of
each being to its coinjolex organic and inorganic conditions of
life, — has been briefly treated in my ‘ Origin of Species.’ It
was there shown that all organic beings, without exception,
tend to increase at so high a ratio, that no district, no station,
not even the whole surface of the land or the whole ocean,
“ Leon Dufour in ‘ Annales des Scienc. Nat.’(3rLl scries. Zoolog.), tom. r. p. 6.
H
INTRODUCTION.
would hold the progeny of a single pair after a certain nnmhei-^
of generations. The inevitable result is an ever -recurrent
Struggle for Existence. It has truly been said that all
nature is at war ; the strongest ultimately prevail, the
weakest fail ; and we well know that myriads of forms have
disappeared from the face of the earth. If then organic beings
in a state of nature vary even in a slight degree, owing to
changes in the surrounding conditions, of which we have
abundant geological evidence, or from any other cause ; if,
in the long course of ages, inheritable variations ever arise
in any way advantageous to any being under its excessively
complex and changing relations of life ; and it would be a
strange fact if beneficial variations did never arise, seeing
how many have arisen which man has taken advantage of for
his own profit or pleasure ; if then these contingencies ever
occur, and I do not see how the probability of their occur-
rence can be doubted, then the severe and often-recurrent
struggle for existence will determine that those variations,
however slight, which are favourable shall be preserved
or selected, and those wbicb are unfavourable sball be
destroyed.
This preservation, during tlie battle for life, of varieties
which possess any advantage in structure, constitution, or
instinct, I have called Natural Selection ; and Mr. Herbert
Spencer has well expressed the same idea by the Survival of
the Fittest. The term “ natural selection ” is in some respects
a bad one, as it seems to imply conscious choice ; but this
will be disregarded after a little familiarity. No one objects
to chemists speaking of elective affinity ; ” and certainly an
acid lias no more choice in combining with a base, than the
conditions of life have in determining whether or not a new
form be selected or preserved. The term is so far a good
one as it brings into connection the production of domestio
races by man’s power of selection, and the natural preserva-
tion of varieties and species in a state of nature. For brevity
sake I sometimes speak of natural selection as an intelligent
))ower ; — in the same way as astronomers speak of the attrac-
tion of gravity as ruling the movements of the planets, or
as agriculturists speak of man making domestic races by his
NATURAL SELECTION.
7
i
power of selection. In the one case, as in the other, selection
does nothing without variability, and this depends in some
manner on the action of the surrounding circumstances Mn the
organism. I have, also, often personified the word Nature ;
for 1 have found it difficult to avoid this ambiguity ; but
I mean by nature only the aggregate action and product
of many natural laws, — and by laws only the ascertained
secpience of events.
It has been shown from many facts that the largest amount
of life can be supported on each area, by great diversification
or divergence in the structure and constitution of its inhabi-
tants. We have, also, seen that the continued production ot
new forms through natural selection, which implies that each
new variety has some advantage over others, inevitably
leads to the extermination of the older and less improved
forms. These latter are almost necessarily intermediate in
structure, as well as in descent, between the last-produced
forms and their original parent-species. Now, if we suppose
a species to produce two or more varieties, and these in
the course of time to produce other varieties, the principal
of good being derived from diversification of structure will
generally lead to the preservation of the most divergent
varieties ; thus the lesser differences characteristic of varieties
come to be augmented into the greater differences character-
istic of species, and, by the extermination of the older inter-
mediate forms, new species end by being distinctly defined
objects. Thus, also, we shall see how it is that organic
beings can be classed by what is called a natural method
ill distinct groups— species under genera, and genera under
families.
As all the inhabitants of each country may be said, owing
to their high rate of reproduction, to be striving to increase
in numbers; as each form comes into competition with many
other forms in the struggle for life,— for destroy any one
and its place will be seized by others ; as every part of the
organization occasionally varies in some slight degree, and
as natural selection acts exclusively by the preservation of
variations which are advantageous under the excessively
comjjlex conditions to which each being is exposed, no limif
8
INTRODUCTION.
exists to the .number, singularity, and perfection of tlu
contrivances and co-adaptations which may thus be pro-'
duced. An animal or a plant may thus slowly become
related in its structure and habits in the inost intricate
manner to many other animals and plants, and to tlie
physical conditions of its home. Variations in the organiza-
tion will in some cases be aided by habit, or by the use and
disuse of parts, and they will be governed by the direct
action of the surrounding physical conditions and by
correlation of growth.
On the principles here briefly sketched out, there is no
innate or necessary tendency in each being to its own ad- '
van cement in the scale of organization. We are almost
compelled to look at the specialization or differentiation of
parts or organs for different functions as the best or even sole
standard of advancement ; for by such division of labour each
function of body and mind is better performed. And as
natural selection acts exclusively through the preservation of
profitable medications of structure, and as the conditions of
life in each area generally become more and more complex
from the increasing number of different forms which inhabit
it and from most of these forms acquiring a more and more
perfect structure, we may confidently believe, that, on the
whole, organization advances. IS^evertheless a very simj)le
form fitted for very simple conditions of life might remain
for indefinite ages unaltered or unimproved ; for what would
it profit an infusorial animalcule, for instance, or an intestinal
worm, to become highly organized ? Members of a high group
might even become, and this apparently has often occurred,
fitted for simpler conditions of life ; and in this case natural
selection would tend to simplify or degrade the organization^
for complicated mechanism for simple actions would be useless
or even disadvantageous.
The arguments opposed to the theory of Natural Selection,
have been discussed in my ‘ Origin of Species,’ as far as the
size of that work permitted, under the following heads ;
the difficulty in understanding how very simple organs have
been converted by small and graduated steps into higiily
p(U’fect and complex organs ; the marvellous facts of
NATURAL SELECTION.
9
Instinct ; the whole question of Hybridity ; and, lastly, the
absence in our known geological formations of innumerable
links connecting all allied species. Although some of these
difficulties are of great weight, we shall see that many of
them are explicable on the theory of natural selection, and are
otherwise inexplicable.
In scientific investigations it is permitted to invent any
hypothesis, and if it explains various large and independent
classes of facts it rises to the rank of a well-grounded theory.
The undulations of the ether and even its existence are hypo-
thetical, yet every one now admits the imdulatory theory of
light. The principle of natural selection may be looked at as
a mere hypothesis, but rendered in some degree probable by
what we positively know of the variability of organic beings
in a state of nature, — by what we positively know of the
struggle for existence, and the consequent almost inevitable
preservation of favourable variations, — and from the analogical
formation of domestic races. Kow this hypothesis may be
tested, — and this seems to me the only fair and legitimate
manner of considering the whole question, — by trying
whether it explains several large and independent classes of
facts; such as the geological succession of organic beings,
their distribution in pa.st and present times, and their mutual
affinities and homologies. If the principle of natural selection
does explain these and other large bodies of facts, it ought to
be received. On the ordinary view of each species having
been independently created, we gain no scientific explanation
of any one of these facts. We can only say that it has so
pleased the Creator to command that the past and present
inhabitants of the world should appear in a certain order and
in certain areas; that He has impressed on them the most
extraordinary resemblances, and has classed them in groups
subordinate to groups. But by such statements we gain no
new knowledge ; we do not connect together facts and laws ;
we explain nothing.
It was the consideration of such large groups of facts
as these which first led me to take up the present subject.
When I visited during the voyage of H.M.S. Beagle, the
Galapagos Archipelago, situated in the Pacific Ocean about
10
INTRODUCTION.
500 miles from- South America, I found myself surroiimled
by peculiar species of birds, reptiles, and plants, existing
nowhere else in the world. Yet they nearly all bore an
American stamp. In the song of the mocking- thrush, in the
harsh cry of the carrion-hawk, in the great candlestick-liko
opuntias, I clearly perceived the neighbourhood of America,
though the islands were separated by so many miles of oc^iaii
from the mainland, and differed much in their geological
constitution and climate. Still more surprising was the fact
that most of the inhabitants of each separate island in this
small archipelago were specifically different, though most
closely related to each other. 1 he archipelago, with its
innumerable craters and bare streams of lava, appeared to
be of recent origin ; and thus I fancied myself brought near
to the very act of creation. I often asked myself how these
many peculiar animals and plants had been produced : the
simplest answer seemed to be that the inhabitants of the
several islands had descended from each other, undergoing
modification in the course of their descent ; and that all the
inhabitants of the archipelago were descended from those of
the nearest land, namely America, whence colonists would
naturally have been derived. But it long remained to me an
inexplicable problem how the necessary degree of modification
could have been effec ted, and it would have thus remained
for ever, had I not studied domestic productions, and thus
acquired a just idea of the power of Selection. As soon as 1
had fully realized this idea, I saw, on reading Malthus on
Population, that Natural Selection was the inevitable result
of the rapid increase of all organic beings ; for I was prepared
to appreciate the struggle for existence by having long
studied the habits of animals.
Before visiting the Galapagos I had collected many animals
w h list travelling from north to south on both sides of America,
and everywhere, under conditions of life as different as it is
possible to conceive. American forms were met with — species
re]fiacing species of the same peculiar genera. 'Phus it was
when the Cordilleras were ascended, or the thick tropical
forests penetrated, or the fresh waters of America searched.
Subsequently I visited other countries, which in all then
NATUKAL SELECTION.
11
^ conditions of life were incomparably more like parts of South
America, than the different parts of that continent are to
ca(;h other ; yet in these countries, as in Australia or Southern
Africa, the traveller cannot fail to be struck with the entire
difference of their productions. Again the reflection was
forced on ine that community of descent from the early
inliabitants of South America would alone explain the w^o
prevalence of American types tlironghout that immense
area.
To exhume with one’s own hands the bones of extinct and
gigantic quadrupeds brings the whole question of the
succession of species vividly before one’s mind ; and I found
in South America great pieces of tesselated armour exactly
like, but on a magnificent scale, that covering the pigmy
armadillo; I had found great teeth like those of the living
sloth, and bones like those of the cavy. An analogous suc( es-
sionof allied forms had been previously observed in Australia.
Here then we see the prevalence, as if by descent, in time as
in splice, of the same types in the same areas ; and in neither
case does the similarity of the conditions by any means seem
sufficient to account for th*:^ similarity of the forms of life.
It is notorious that the fossil remains of closely consecutix^e
formations are closely allied in structure, and we can at once
understand the fact if they are closely allied by descent.
The succession of the many distinct species of the same
genus throughout the long series of geological formations
seems to have been unbroken or cotitinnous. New species
come in gradually one by one. Ancient and extinct forms of
life are often intermediate in character, like the words of a
dead language with respect to its several offshoots or living
tongues. All these facts seemed to me to point lo descent
with modifii ation as the means of production of new
species.
The innumerable past and present inhabitants of the
world are con ne ted together by the most singular and
complex affinities, and can be classed in groups under groups,
in the same manner as varieties can be classed under species
and sub-varieties under varieties, but with much higher
grades of difference. These complex affinities and the rules
12
INTRODUCTION.
for classification, receive a rational explanation on the thcor’/i
of descent, combined with the principle of natural selectioi/,
which entails divergence of character and the extinction of
intermediate forms. How inexplicable is the similar pattern
of the hand of a man, the foot of a dog, the wing of a bat,
the flipper of a seal, on the doctrine of independent acts of
creation! how simply explained on the principle of the
na'ural selection of successive s'ight var aliens in the
diverg ng descendants from a single progenitor! So it is
wifh certain parts or organs in the same individual animal
or plant, for instance, the jaws and legs of a crab, or the
petals, stamens, and p’sfils of a flower. During the many
changes to which in the conrse of time organic beings have
been subjected, certain organs or parts have occasionally
become at first of little use and ultimately superfluous ; and
the retention of such parts in a rudimentary and useless
condition is intelligible on the theory of descent. It can be
shown that modifications of structure are generally inherited
by the offspring at the same age at which each successive
variation appeared in the parents ; it can further be shown
that variations do not commonly supervene at a very early
period of embryonic growth, and on these two principles we
can understand that most wonderful fact in the whole circuit
of natural history, namely, the close similarity of the embryos
within the same great class — for instance, those of mammals,
birds, reptiles, and fish.
It is the consideration and explanation of such facts as
these which has convinced me that the theory of descent
with modification by mean of natural selection is in the
main true. These facts have as yet received no explanation
on the theory of independent Creation; they cannot be
groupt-d together under one point of view, but each has to be
considered as an ultimate fact. As the first origin of life on
this earth, as well as the continued life of each individual, is
at present quite beyond the scope of science, I do not wish to
lay much stress on the greater simplicity of the view of a few
forms or of onl37’ one form having been originally created,
instead of innumerable miraculous creations having been
accessary at innumerable periods ; though this more ciinple
NATUEAL SELECTION.
13
j I
vi«w accords well with Manpertuis’s philosophical axiom of
“ le -st actio-'.”
Ill considering how far the theory of natural selectit.n
may be extended, — that is, in determining from how many
progenitors the inhabitants of the world hnve descended, —
we may conclude that at least all the members of the same
class have descended from a single ancestor. A number of
organic beinas are included in the sane class, because they
present, independently of their habits of life, the same funda-
mental type of structure, and because they graduate into each
other. Moreover, members of the same class can in most
cases be shown to be closely alike at an early embryonic age.
These facts can be explained on the belief of their descent from
a common form ; therefore it may be safely admitted that all
the members of the same class are descended from one pro-
genitor. But as the members of quite distinct clas-es have
something in common in structure and much in common in
constitution, analogy would lead us one step further, and to
infer as probable that all living creatures are descended from
a single prototype.
I hope that the reader will pause before coming to any
final and hostile conclusion on the theory of natural selection.
The reader may consult my ‘ Origin of Species’ for a general
sketch of the whole subject ; but in that work he has to take
many statements on trust. In considering the theory of
natural selection, he will assuredly meet with weighty
difficulties, but these difficulties relate chiefly to subjects — ■
such as the degree of perfection of the geological record, the
means of distribution, the possibility of transitions in organs,
&o. — on which we are confessedly ignorant; nor do we know
how ignorant we are- If we are much more ignorant than
is generally supposed, most of these difficulties wholly
disappear. Let the leader reflect on the difficulty of looking
at whole classes of facts from a new point of view. Le^ him
observe how slowly, but surely, the noble views of Lyell on
the gradual changes now in progress on the earth’s surface
have been accepted as sufficient to account for all that we see
in its past history. The present action of natural selection
may seem more or less probable ; but I believe in the truth of
14
INTRODUCTION.
the theory, because it collects, under one point of view, and
gives a rational explanation of, many apparently independent
classes of facts.^
4 In treating the several subjects
included in the present and my other
works I have continually been led to
ask for information from many zoolo-
gists, botanists, geologists, breeders
of animals, and horticulturists, and I
have invariably received from them
the most generous assistance. With-
out such aid I could have effected
little. I have repeatedly applied
for information and specimens to
foreigners, and to British merchants
and officers of the Government re-
siding in distant lands, and, with the
rarest exceptions, I have received
prompt, open-handed, and valuable
assistance. I cannot express too
strongly my obligations to the many
persons who have assisted me, and
who, I am convinced, would be
equally willing to assist others in
any scientific investigation.
Chap. I.
DOGS: TEEIR PARENTAGE.
15
CHAPTER I.
DOMESTIC DOGS AND CATS.
ANCIEXT VARIETIES OF THE DOG — KESEMBLAISICE OF DOMESTIC DOGS IN VARIOUS
COUNTRIES TO NATIVE CANINE SPECIES — ANIMALS NOT ACQUAINTED WITH
MAN AT FIRST FEARLESS DOGS RESEMBLING WOLVES AND JACKALS — HABIT
or BARKING ACQUIRED AND LOST — FERAL DOGS — TAN-COLOURED EYE-SPO^ .j
— PERIOD OF GESTATION — OFFENSIVE ODOUR — FERTILITY OF THE RACES WHEN
CROSSED — DIFFERENCES IN THE SEVERAL RACES IN PART DUE TO DESCENT
FROM DISTINCT SPECIES — DIFFERENCES IN THE SKULL AND TEETH — DIFFER-
ENCES IN THE BODY, IN CONSTITUTION — FEW IMPORTANT DIFFERENCES
HAVE BEEN FIXED BY SELECTION — DIRECT ACTION OF CLIMATE — WATER-
DOGS WITH PALMATED FEET — HISTORY OF THE CHANGES WI}l(:!H CERTAIN
ENGLISH RACES OF THE DOG HAVE GRADUALLY UNDERGONE THROUGH
SELECTION — EXTINCTION OF THE LESS IMPROVED SUB-BREEDS.
CATS, CROSSED WITH SEVERAL SPECIES — DIFFERENT BREE' S FOUND ONLY IN
SEPARATED COUNTRIES — DIRECT EFFECTS OF THE COFTDITIONS OF LIFE —
FERAL CATS — INDIVIDUAL VARIABILITY.
Thu, first and chief point of interest in this chapter is, whether
thenuinerons domesticated varieties of the dog have descended
from a single wild species, or from several. Some authors
believe that all have descended from the wolf, or from the
jackal, or from an unknown and extinct species. Others again
believe, and this of late has been the favourite tenet, that they
have descended from several species, extinct and recent, more
or less commingled together. VV e shall probably never be able
to ascertain their origin with certainty. Palaeontology ^ does
not throw much light on the question, owing, on the one
hand, to the close similarity of the skulls of extinct as well
as living wolves and jackals, and owing, on the other hand, to
* Owen, ‘ British Fossil Mammals,*
|>p. 123 to 133. Pictet’s ‘ Traite de
I’al.,’ 185 E tom. i. p. 202. De Blain-
ville, in his ‘ Osteographie, Canidas,’
p. 142, has largely discussed the
whole subject, and concludes that
the extinct parent of all domesticated
dogs came nearest to the wolf iu
organization, and to the jackal hi
habits. See also Boyd Dawkins,
‘Cave Hunting,* 1874, p. 131, &c.,
and his other publications. Jeitteles
has discussed in great detail the
character of the breeds of pre-historic
dogs : ‘ Die vorgeschichtlichen Alter-
thiimer der Stadt Olmlitz,’ IJ. Theii,
1372, p. 44 to onj.
DOGS.
Chap. L
16 .
the great dissimilarity of the skulls of the sevoial breeds of
the domestic dogs. It seems, however, that remains have
been found in the later tertiary deposits more like those of a
large dog than of a wolf, which favours the belief of De
Blainville that our dogs are the descendants of a single ex-
tinct species. On the other hand, some authors go so far as
to assert that every chief domestic breed must have had its
wild prototype. This latter view is extremely improbable ;
it allows nothing for variation ; it passes over the almost
monstrous character of some of the breeds ; and it almost ne
ei.3sarily assumes that a large number of species have become
extinct since man domesticated the dog ; whereas we plainly
see that wild members of the dog-family are extirpated
by human agency with much difficulty; even so recently
as 1710 the wolf existed in so small an island as Ireland.
Idle reasons which have led various authors to infer that
our dogs have descended from more than one wild species are
as follows.^ Firstly, the great difference between the several
breeds ; but this will appear of comparatively little weight,
after we shall have seen how great are the differences between
the several races of various domesticated animals which cer-
tainly have descended from a single parent-form. Secondly,
the more important fact, that, at the most anciently known
historical periods, several breeds of the dog existed, very
unlike each other, and closely resembling or identical with
breeds still alive.
We will briefly run back through the historical records.
* Pallas, I believe, originated this
doctrine in ‘Act. Acad. St. Peters-
biirgh,’ 1780, Part ii. Ehrenberg has
advocated it, as may be seen in De
Blainville’s ‘ O.-teographie,’ p. 79. It
has been carried to an extreme extent
by Col. Hamilton Smith in the
‘ Naturalist Library,’ vols. ix. and x.
;Mr. W. C. Martin adopts it in his
excellent ‘History of the Dog,’ 1845 ;
as does Dr. Morton, as well as Nott
and Gliddon, in the United States.
Prof. Low, in his ‘ Domesticated
Animals,’ 1845, p. 666, comes to this
same conclusion. No one has argued
on this side with more clearness and
force than the late James Wilson, of
Edinburgh, in various papers read
before the Highland Agricultural and
Wernerian Societies. Isidore Geoffroy
Saint-Hilaire (‘ Hist. Nat. Gen.,’ 1860,
tom. iii p. 107), though he believes
that most dogs have descended from
the jackal, yet inclines to the belief
that some are descended from the
wolf. Prof. Gervais (‘ Hist. Nat.
Mamm.’ 1855, tom. ii. p. 69, referrir j
to the view that all the domest a
races are the modified descendants of a
single species, after a long discussion,
says, “Cette opinion est,suivant nous
du moins, la moins probable.”
C"hap. 1.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
17
The materials are remarkably deficient between the four-
teenth century and the Roman classical period.^ At this
latter period various breeds, namely hounds, house-dogs, lap
dogs, &c., existed ; but, as Dr. Walther has remarked, it is
impossible to recognise the greater number with any cer-
tainty. Youatt, however, gives a drawing of a beautiful
sculpture of two greyhound puppies from the V ilia of An-
toninus. On an Assyrian monument, about 640 B.&f an
enormous mastiff^ is figured ; and according to Sir H.
Rawlinson (as I was informed at the British Museum),
similar dogs are still imported into this same country. I
have looked through the magnificent works of Lepsius and
Rosellini, and on the Egyptian monuments from the fourth
to the twelfth dynasties (i.e. from about 3400 b.c. to 2100 b.c.)
several varieties of the dog are represented ; most of them are
allied to greyhounds ; at the later of these periods a dog
resembling a hound is figured, with drooping ears, but with
a longer back and more pointed head than in our hounds.
There is, also, a turnspit, with short and crooked legs, closely
resembling the existing variety ; but this kind of monstrosity
is so common with various animals, as with the aneon sheep,
and even, according to Eengger, with jaguars in Paraguay,
that it would be rash to look at the monumental animal as
the parent of all our turnspits : Colonel Sykes ^ also has
described an Indian pariah dog as presenting the same
monstrous character. The most ancient dog represented on
the Egyptian monuments is one of the most singular; it
resembles a grejdiound, but has long pointed ears and a short
curled tail ; a closely allied variety still exists in Northern
® Berjeau, ‘The Varieties of the
Dog ; in old Sculptures and Pictures,’
1863, ‘Der Hund,’ von Dr. F. L.
Walther, Giessen, 1817, s. 48, : this
author seems carefully to have studied
all classical works on the subject.
See also Volz, ‘ Beitrage zur Kultur-
geschichte,’ Leipzig, 1852, s. 115
‘Youatt on the Dog,’ 1845, p. 6. A
very full histoi y is given by De
Blainville in hks ‘ Osteographie,
Canidse.’
^ J have seen drawings of this dog
8
from the tomb of the son of Esar
Haddor., and clay models in the
British Museum. Nott and Gliddon,
in their ‘Types of Mankind,’ 1854, p
393, give a copy of these drawings
This dog has been called a Thibetax.
mastiff, but Mr. H. A. Oldfield, who
is familiar with the so-called Thil el
mastiff, and has examined the draw-
ings in the British Museum, informs
me that he considers them different.
® ‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,* July 12th,;
1831.
18
DOGS.
(Jhap. I
Africa; for Mr. E. Vernon Ilarcourt*^ states that the Ai*ah
boar-hound is “ an eccentric hieroglyphic animal, ouch as
Cheops once hunted with, somewhat resembling the rcjugh
Scotch deer-hound ; their tails are curled tight round on theii
backs, and their ears stick out at right angles.” With this
most ancient variety a pariah-like dog coexisted.
Wo thus see that, at a period between four and five thou-
sand years ago, various breeds, viz. pariah dogs, greyhounds,
common hounds, mastiffs, house-dogs, lapdogs, and turnspits,
existed, more or less closely resembling our present breeds.
But there is not sufficient evidence that any of these ancient
dogs belonged to the same identical sub-varieties with our
present dogs.'^ As long as man was believed to have existed
on this earth only about 6000 years, this fact of the great
diversity of the breeds at so early a period was an argument
of much weight that they had proceeded from several wild
sources, for there would not have been sufficient time for their
divergence and modification. But now that we know, from
the discovery of flint tools embedded with the remains of
extinct animals in districts which have since undergone great
geographical changes, that man has existed for an incom-
parably longer period, and bearing in mind that the most
barbarous nations possess domestic dogs, the argument from
insufficient time falls away greatly in value.
Long before tbe period of any historical record the dog was
domesticated in Europe. In the Danish Middens of the Neo-
lithic or Newer Stone period, bones of a canine animal are
imbedded, and Steenstriip ingeniously argues that these be-
longed to a domestic dog ; for a very large proportion of the
bones of birds preserved in the refuse consists of long bones,
which it was found on trial dogs cannot devour.® This ancient
® ‘Sporting in Algeria,’ p. 51.
’’ Berjeau gives f'ac-similes of the
Egyptian drawings. Mr. C. L. Martin
in his ‘History of the Dog,’ 18+5,
copies several figures from the Egypt-
ian monuments, and speaks with
ranch confidence with respect to their
identity with still living dogs. Messrs.
Notttind Gliddon (‘Types of Mankind,
1854, p. 388) give still more numerous
Hguros. Mr. Gliddon asserts that a
curl-tailed greyhound, like that repre-
sented on the' most ancient monu-
ments, is common in Borneo; but
the Rajah, Sir J. Brooke, informs me
that no such dog exists thei’e.
* These, and the following facts on
the Danish remains, are taken from
M. Morlot’s most interesting memoir
in ‘ Soc. Vaudoise des Sc. Nat.’ tom. vi..
1860, pp. 281, 299, 320.
Chap. I.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
19
dog was succeeded in Denmark during the Bronze period by
a larger kind, presenting certain difierences, and this again
during the Iron period, by a still larger kind. In Switzer-
land, we hear from Prof. Putiioeyer,^ that during the Neo-
lithic period a domesticated dog of middle size existed, which
in its skull was about equally remote from the wolf and jackal,
and partook of the characters of our hounds -and setters or
spaniels (Jagdhund und Wachtelhund). Kiitimeyer insists
strongly on the constancy of form during a very long period
of time of this the most ancient known dog. During the
Bronze period a larger dog appeared, and this closely re-
sembled in its jaw a dog of the same age in Denmark.
Remains of two notably distinct varieties of the dog were
found by Schmerling in a cave but their age cannot be
positively determined.
The existence of a single race, remarkably constant in form
during the whole Neolithic period, is an interesting fact in
contrast with what we see of the changes which the races
underwent during the period of the successive Egyptian
monuments, and in contrast with our existing dogs. The
character of this animal during the Neolithic period, as given
by Rutimcjmr, supj)orts De Blainville’s view that our varieties
have descended from an unknown and extinct form. But we
should not forget that we know nothing with respect to the
antiquity of man in the warmer parts of the world. The
succession of the difierent kinds of dogs in Switzerland and
Denmark is thought to be due to the immigration of conquer-
ing tribes bringing with them their dogs; and this view
accords with the belief that different .wild canine animals
were domesticated in different regions. Independently of
the immigration of new races of man, we know from the
wide-spread presence of bronze, composed of an alloy of tin,
how much commerce there must have been throughout
Europe at an extremely remote period, and dogs would then
probably have been bartered. At the present time, amongst
the savages of the interior of Guiana, the Taruma Indians
» ‘Die Fauna der Pfahlbauten,’ 1861, s. 117, 162.
10 De Blaliiville, ‘ Osteographie, Canidse.’
20
DOGS.
(Jhap. 1
are considered -the best trainers of dogs, and possess a Jargo
breed which they barter at a high price with otlici
tribes.
The main argument in favour of the several breeds of the
dog being the descendants of distinct wild stocks, is their
resemblance in various countiies to distinct species still
existing there. It must, however, be admitted that the com-
parison between the wild and domesticated animal has been
made but in few- cases with sufficient exactness. Before
entering on details, it will be well to show that there is no
a priori difficulty in the belief that several canine species
have been domesticated. Members of the dog family in-
habit liearly the whole world; and several species agree
pretty closely in habits and structuie with our several
domesticated dogs. Mr. Galton has shown how fond
savages are of keeping and taming animals of all kinds.
Social animals are the most easily subjugated by man,
and several species of Canidae hunt in packs. It deser\ es
notice, as bearing on other animals as well as on the
dog, that at an extremely ancient period, when man first
entered any country, the animals living there would have
felt no instinctive or inherited fear of him, and would come
cpiently have been tamed far more easily than at piesent
For instance, when the Falkland Islands were fi.rst visited by
man, the large wolf-like dog (Canis antarcticus) fearlessly
came to meet Byron’s sailors, who, mistaking this ignorant
curiosity for ferocity, ran into the water to avoid them; even
recently a man, by holding a piece of meat in one hand and a
knife in the other, c(juld sometimes stick them at night. On
an island in the Sea of Aral, when first discovered by
Butakoff, the saigak antelopes, which aie “generally very
timid and watchful, aid not fly from us, but on the contiary
looked at us with a sort of curiosit}^” So, again, on the
shores of the Mauritius, the manatee was not at first in the
least afraid of man, and thus it has been in several quarters
of the wojld with seals and the morse. I have elsewhere
Sir R. Schomburgk has giA^en me xiii., 1843, p. 65.
inrormation on this head. See also ‘ Domestication of Animals :
'Journal of R. Geograph. Soc.’ vol. Ethnological Soc., Dec. 22nd, 1863.
Uhap. 1.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
21
sbown how slowly the native birds of several islands have
acquired and inherited a salutary dread of man : at the Gala-
pagos Archipelago I pushed witli the inr.zzle of my gun
hawks from a branch, and held out a pitcher of water for
other birds to alight on and drink. Quadrupeds and birds
which have seldom been disturbed by man, dread him ho
more than do our English birds, the cows, or horses grazing
in the fields. ^
It is a more important consideration that several canine
species evince (as will be shown in a future chapter) no
strong repugnance or inability to breed under confinement ;
and the incapacity to breed under confinement is one of the
commonest bars to domestication. Lastly, savages set the
highest value, as we shall see in the chapter on Selection, on
dogs : even half-tamed animals are highly useful to them :
the Indians of North America cross their half-wild dogs with
wolves, and thus render them even wilder than before, but
bolder; the savages of Guiana catch and partially tanre and
use the whelps of two wild species of Canis, as do the savages
of Australia those of the wild Dingo. Mr. Philip King in-
forms me that he once trained a wild Dingo pupjry to drive
cattle, and found it very useful. From these several con-
siderations we see that there is no difficulty in believing that
man miglit have domesticated various canine species in dif-
ferent countries. It would indeed have been a strange fact
if one species alone had been domesticated throughout the
world.
We will now enter into details. The accurate and sagacious
Eichardson says, “ The resemblance between the Northern
American wolves (Cams lupus, var. occidentalis) and the
domestic dogs of the Indians is so great that the size and
strength of the wolf seems to be the only difference. I have
iirore than once mistaken a band of wolves for the dogs of
a party of Indians ; and the howl of the animals of both
species is prolonged so exactly in the same key that even the
** ‘ Journal of Researclies,’ &c., of the autolope, see ‘ Journal R/iytil
1845, p. 393. With respect to Cam's Geograph. Soc.,’ vol. xxiii. p, 94.
antaretkus, see p. 193. For the r/ise
DOGS.
OlIAI>. I
practised ear of tlio Indian fails at times to discriminate them.'
He adds that the more northern Escpiimanx dogs are not only
extremely like the grey wolves of the Ai-ctic circle in form
and colour, bnt also nearly equal them in size. Dr. Kano
has often seen in his teams of sledge- dogs the oblique eye
(a character on which some naturalists lay great stress), the
drooping tail, and scared look of the wolf. In disposition
the Esquimaux dogs differ little from wolves, and, according
to Dr, Hayes, they are capable of no attachment to man, and
are so savage that when hungry they will attack even their
masters. According to Kane they readily become feral.
Their affinity is so close with wolves that they frequently
cross with them, and the Indians take the whelps of wolves
“ to improve the breed of their dogs,” The half-bred wolves
sometimes (Lamare-Picquot) cannot be tamed, “ though this
case is rare but they do not become thoroughly well broken
in till the second or third generation. These facts show that
there can be but little, if any, sterility between the Esqui-
maux dog and the wolf, for otherwise they would not be used
to improve the breed. As Dr. Hayes says of these dogs,
“ reclaimed wolves they doubtless are.”
North America is inhabited by a second kind of wolf, the
prairie-wolf (Canis latrans), which is now looked at by all
naturalists as specifically distinct from the common wolf; and
is, according to Mr, J. K. Lord, in some respects intermediate
in habits bet veen a wolf and a fox. Sir J. Richardson, after
describing the 1 1 are Indian dog, which differs in many respects
from the Esquimaux dog, says, “It bears the same relation to
the prairie-wolf that the Esquimaux dog does to the great
The authorities for the foregoing
statements are as follow : — Richard-
son, in ‘ Fauna Boreali-Americana,’
18‘i9, pp. 64, 75; Dr. Kane, ‘Arctic
Explorations,’ 1856, vol, i. pp. 398,
455 ; Dr. Hayes, ‘ Arctic Boat Jour-
ney,’ 1860, p. 167. yrankiin’s
‘ Narrative,’ vol. i. p. 269, gives the
case of three whelps of a black wolf
being carried away by the Indians.
Parry, Richardson, and others, give
accounts of woives and dogs naturally
crossing in the eastern parts of North
America. Seeman, in his ‘ Voyage of
H.M.S. FTerald, 1853, vol. ii. pi 2G,
says the wolf is often caught by the
Esquimaux for the purpose of crossi?'.g
with their dogs, and thus adding to
their size and strength. M. Lamare-
Picquot, in ‘Bull, de la Soc. d’Accli-
mat.’ tom. vii., I860, p. 148, gives a
good account of the half-bred L'qu)-'
maux dogs.
Chap. L
THEIK PAEENTAGE
23
grey wolf.” He could, m fact, detect no marked differeiic.o
betv/een them ; and Messrs. Nott and Gliddon giTc additional
details showing their close resemblance. The dogs derived from
the above two aboriginal sources cross together and with the
wild wolves, at least with the G. occidenialis, and with European
dogs. In Florida, according to Bartram, the black wolf-dog
of the Indians differs in nothing from the wolves of that
country except in barking.^^
Turning to the southern parts of the new world, Columbus
found two kinds of dogs in the West Indies ; and Fernandez
describes three in Mexico : some of these native dogs were
dumb — that is, did not bark. Jn Guiana it has been known
since the time of Buffon that the natives cross their dogs
with an aboriginal species, apparently the Canis cancrivorus.
Sir R. Schomburgk, who has so carefully explored these
regions, writes to me, “ I have been repeatedly told by the
Arawaak Indians, who reside near the coast, that they cross
their dogs with a wild species to improve the breed, and
individual dogs have been shown to me which certainly
resembled the G. cancrivorus much more than the common
breed. It is but seldom that the Indians keep the G. cancri-
vorus for domestic purposes, nor is the Ai, another species
of wild dog, and which I consider to be identical with the
Dusicijon silvestris of H. Smith, now much used by the Are-
cunas for the purpose of hunting. The dogs of the I'aruma
Indians are quite distinct, and resemble Buffon’s St. Domingo
greyhound.” It thus appears that the natives of Guiana have
partially domesticated two aboriginal species, and still cross
their dogs with them ; these two species belong to a quite dif-
ferent type from the North American and European wolves. A
^ ' ‘ Fauna Boreal i-A m e r i c a n a,’
})p. 73, 78, 80. Nott and
Gliddcn, ‘ Types of Mankind,’ p. 383.
The naturalist and traveller Bartram
IS quoted by Hamilton Smith, in ‘Na-
turalist Lib.,’ vol. X. p. 15(5. A Mexican
domestic dog seems also to resemble a
wild dog of the same country ; but
this may be the prairie-wolf. Another
capable judge, Mr. J. K. Lord (‘Tlio
Naturalist in Vancouver Island,’ 18(5(3,
vol. ii. p. 218), says that the Indian
dog of the Spokans, near the Rocky
Mountains, “is beyond all question
nothing more than a tamed Cayote or
prairie-wmlf,” or Canis latrans.
1 quote this from Mr. R. Hill’.s
excellent account of the Alco oi
domestic dog of Mexico, iu Gosso’s
‘ Naturalist’s Sojourn in J.amaica,
1851, p. 329.
2t
DOGS.
Chap. I
careful observer, Eeiigger,^'^ gives reasons for believing that a
hairless dog was domesticated when America was first visited
by Europeans : some of these dogs in Paraguay are still dumb,
and d’schudi states that they suffer from cold in the Cor-
dillera. This naked dog is, however quite distinct fromthaf
found preserved in the ancient Peruvian burial-places, and de-
scribed by Tschudi, under the name of Canis ingce, as with-
standing cold well and as barking. It is not known whether
these two distinct kinds of dog are the descendants of native
species, and it might be argued that when man first migrated
into America he brought with him from the Asiatic continent
dogs which had not learned to bark ; but this view does not
seem probable, as the natives along the line of their march from
the north reclaimed, as we have seen, at least two N. American
species of Canidai.
d’'urning to the Old World, some European dogs closely
resemble the wolf ; thus the shepherd dog of the plains of
Hungary is white or reddish-brown, has a sharp nose, short,
erect ears, shaggy coat, and bush}^ tail, and so much resembles
a wolf that Mr. Paget, who gives this desci ijDtion, says he has
known a Hungarian mistake a wolf for one of his own dogs.
J eitteles, also, remarks on the close similarity of the Hungarian
dog and wolf. Shepherd dogs in Italy must anciently have
closely resembled wolves, for Columella (vii. 12) advises that
white dogs be kept, adding, “ pastor album probat, ne pro lupo
canem feriat.” Several accounts have been given of dogs and
wolves crossing naturally ; and Pliny asserts that the Gauls
tied their female dogs in the woods that they might cross
with wolves. The European wolf differs slightly from that
of North America, and has been ranked by many naturalists
as a distinct species. The common wolf of India is also by
some esteemed as a third species, and here again we find a
’’ ‘ Natiirgeschichte der Sauge-
Ihiere von Paraguay,’ 1830, s. 151.
Quoted in Humboldt’s ‘Aspects
cf Nature’ (Eng. trans.), vol. i. p.
108.
*9 Paget’s ‘ Travels in Hungary and
Transylvania,’ \-ol. i. p. 501. Jeitteles,
‘F.auna Huiigarias Sup^rioris,’ 1862, s.
12. See Pliny, ‘ Hist, of the World ’
(Eng. transl.), 8th book, ch. xl., about
the Gauls crossing their dogs. See also
Aristotle, ‘Hist, i^nimal.’ lib. viii. c.
28. For good evidence about wolves
and dogs naturally crossing near the
Pyrenees, see M. Mauduyt, ‘Du Loup
et de ses Races,’ Poitiers, 1851; also
Hal las, in ‘Acta Acad. St. Petersbuf gb,
1780, part ii. p. 94.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
CHAr. L
25
marked resemblance between the pariah dogs of certain
districts of India and the Indian wolf.^*^
With respect to Jackals, Isidore Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire
says that not one constant difference can be pointed out between
their structure and that of the smaller races of dogs. They
agree closely in habits : jackals, when tamed and called by
their master, v-'ag their tails, lick his hands, crouch, and throw
them^selves or their backs ; they smell at the tails of other
dogs, and void their urine sideways ; they roll on carrion or
on animals which they have killed ; and, lastly, when in high
spirits, they run round in circles or in a figure of eight, with
their tails between their legs.^^ A number of excellent
naturalists, from the time of Giildenstadt to that of Ehren-
berg, Hemprich, and Cretzschmar, have expressed themselves
in the strongest terms with respect to the resemblance of the
half-domestic dogs of Asia and Egypt to jackals. M. Nord-
mann, fijr instance, says, “ Les chiens d’Awhasie ressemblent
etonnamment a des chacals.” Ehrenberg asserts that the
domestic dogs of Lower Egypt, and certain mummied dogs,
have for their wild type a species of wolf (G. lupaster') of the
country; whereas the domestic dogs of Nubia and certain
other mummied dogs have the closest relation to a wild species
of the same country, viz. C. sahhar, which is only a form of
the common jackal. Pallas asserts that jackals and dogs
sometimes naturally cross in the East; and a case is on
record in Algeria.^^ The greater number of naturalists
divide the jackals of Asia and Africa into several species, but
come few rank them all as one.
J give this on excellent authority,
namely, Mr. Blyth (under the signa-
ture of Zoo[)hilus), in the ‘ Indian
Sporting Review,’ Oct. 1856, p. 134.
Mr. Blyth states that he was struck
with the resemblance between a brush-
tailed race of pariah-dogs, north-west
of Cawnpore, and the Indian wolf. He
gives corroborative evidence with
respect to the dogs of the valley of
the Nerbudda.
For numerous and interesting
details on the resemblance of dogs and
jackals, see Isid. Geoffroy St.-Hi'aire,
‘Hisl. Nat. 1860, tom. iii. p. 101.
See also ‘ Hist. Nat. des Mammiferes,
par Prof. Gervais, 1855, tom. ii. p. 60.
22 Also Giildenstadt, ‘ Nov. Conr-
ment. Acad. Petrop.,’ tom. xx., pro
anno 1775, p. 449. Also Salvin, ijj
‘Land and Water,’ Oct. 1869.
23 Quoted by De Blainville in his
‘ Osteographie, Canidae,’ pp. 79, 98.
2^ See Pallas, in ‘Act. Acad. St.
Petersburgh,’ 1780, part ii. p. 91-
For Algeria, see Isid, Geoffroy St.-
Hilaire, ‘ Hist. Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii. p.
177. In both countries it is the male
jackal which pairs with lemale
domestic dogs.
DOGS.
Chap. I
2(i
I may add that the domestic dogs on the coast of Guinea
are fox-like animals, and are durnb.'^^ On the east coast of
Africa, between lat. 4'’ and 6^^ south, and about ten days’ journey
in the interior, a semi-domestic dog, as the Eev. S. Erhardt
informs me, is kept, which the natives assert is derived from
a similar wild animal. Lichtenstein says that the dogs of
the Bosjemans present a striking resemblance even in colour
(excepting the black stripe down the back) with the C. rneso-
melas of South Africa. Mr. E. Layard informs me that he
has seen a Caftre dog which closely resembled an Esquimaux
dog. In Australia flie Dingo is both domesticated and wild ;
though this animal may have been introduced aboriginally
by man, yet it must be considered as almost an endemic form,
for its remains have been found in a similar state of preser-
vation and associated with extinct mammals, so that its
introduction must have been ancient.
From this resemblance of the half-domesticated dogs in
several countries to the wild species still living there, — from
the facility with which they can often be crossed together, —
from even half-tamed animals being so much valued by
savages, — and from the other circumstances previously re-
marked on which favour their domestication, it is highly
probable that the domestic dogs of the world are descended
from two well-defined species of wolf (viz. C. lupus and
C. latrans), and from two or three other doubtful species
fnamely, the European, Indian, and North African wolves) ;
from at least one or two South American canine species ;
from several races or species of jackal ; and perhaps from
one or more extinct species. Although it is possible or even
probable that domesticated dogs, introduced into any country
and bred there for many generations, might acquire some of
the characters proper to the aboriginal Canidse of the country,
we can hardly thus account for introduced dogs having given
26 John Barhnt’s ‘ Description of
the Coast of Guinea in 1746.’
26 ‘ Travels in South Africa,’ voL ii.
p. 272.
27 Selwyn, Geology of Victoria ;
‘ Journal of Geolog. Soc.,’ vol. xiv.,
1858, p. 536, and vol. xvi., 1860, p.
148 ; and Prof. M‘Coy, in ‘ Annals and
Mag. of Nat. Hist.’ (3rd series), vol.
ix., 1862, p. 147. The Dingo dilfers
from the dogs of the central Polyne-
sian islands. Dielfenbach remarks
(‘Travels,’ vol. ii. p. 45) that the
native New Zealand dog also differs
from the Dingo.
VUM\ I.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
27
rise to two breeds in the same country, resembling two of its
aboriginal species, as in the above-given cases of Guiana and
of North America.2^
It caunot be objected to the view of several canine species
having been anciently domesticated, that these animals are
tamed with difficulty : facts have been already given on this
liead, but I may add that the young of the Canis primcevus of
India were tamed by Mr. Hodgson,^® and became as sensible
of caresses, and manifested as much intelligence, as any
sporting dog of the same age. There is not much difference,
as we have already shown and shall further see, in habits
between the domestic dogs of the North American Indians and
the wolves of that country, or between the Eastern pariah
dogs and jackals, or between the dogs which have run wild
in various countries and the several natural species of the
family. llie habit of barking, however, which is almost
universal with domesticated dogs, forms an exception, as it
does not characterise a single natural species of the family,
though I am assured that the Canis latrans of North America
utters a noise which closely approaches a bark. But this
habit is soon lost by dogs when they become feral and is soon
reacquired Avhen they are again domesticated. The case of
the wild dogs on the island of Juan Fernandez having become
dumb has often been quoted, and there is reason to believe
that the dumbness ensued in the course of thirty-three years ;
on the other hand, dogs taken from this island by Ulloa
slowly reacquired the habit of barking. The Mackenzie-
river dogs, of the Canis latrans type, when brought to Eng-
land, never learned to bark properly ; but one born in the
Zoological Gardens “made his voice souud as loudly as any
other dog of the same age and size.” According to Trofessoi
28 These latter remarks afford, I navianAdventrires,’1854,vo].i.p. 460.
think, a sufficient answer to some With respect to the jackal, Prof,
criticisms by Mr. Wallace, on the Gervais, ‘ Hist. Nat. Mamm.,’ tom. ii.
multiple origin of dogs, given in , p. 61. With respect to the aguara of
LyelPs ‘ Principles of Geology,’ 1872, Paraguay, see Eengger’s work.
vol. ii. p. 295; so Roulin, in ‘ M4m. present, par
29 ‘ Proceedings Zoolog. Soc.,’ 1833, divers Savans,’ tom. vi. p. 341.
p. 112. See, also, on the taming of si Martin, ‘History of the Dog,’
the common wolf^ L. Lloyd, ‘ Scandi- p. 14.
28
DOGS.
Chap. L
Nillson,®^ wolf-whelp reared by a bitch barks. I, Geoffro)
Saint-Hilaire exhibited a jackal which barked with the same
tone as any common dog.^^ An interesting account has been
given by Mr. G. Clarke of some dogs run wild on Juan do
Nova, in the Indian Ocean ; “ they had entirely lost the
faculty of barking ; they had no inclination for the company
of other dogs, nor did they acquire their voice,” during a
captivity of several months. On the island they “ congregate
in vast packs, and catch sea-birds with as much address as
foxes could display.” The feral dogs of La Plata have not
become dumb ; they are of large size, hunt singly or in packs,
and burrow holes for their young. In these habits tlie
feral dogs of La Plata resemble wolves and jackals ; both of
which hunt either singly or in packs, and burrow holes.^®
These feral dogs have not become uniform in colour on Juan
Fernandez, Juan de Nova, or La Plata.^^ In Cuba the feral
dogs are described by Poeppig as nearly all mouse-ccJ cured,
with short ears and light-blue eyes. In St. Domingo, Col.
Ham. Smith says that the feral dogs are very large, like
greyhounds, of a uniform pale blue-ash, with small ears, and
large light-brown eyes. Even the wild Dingo, though so
anciently naturalised in Australia, “ varies considei ably in
colour,” as I am informed by Mr. P. P. King : a half-bred
Dingo reared in England showed signs of wishing to
burrow.
Prom the several foregoing facts we see that reversion in tlic
feral state gives no indication of the colour or size of the aboriginal
*2 Quoted by L. Lloyd in ‘ Field
Sjiorts of North of Europe,’ vol. i. p.
387.
Quatrefages, ‘ Soc. d’Acclimat.,’
May 11th, 1863, p. 7.
‘ Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.’
vol. XV., 1845, p. 140.
Azara, ‘ Voyages dans I’Amer.
Merid.,’ tom. i. p. 38 L ; his account is
fully confirmed'by Rengger. Quatre-
fages gives an account of a bitch
brought from Jerusalem to France
ft-hich burrowed a hole and littered
tu it. See ‘ Discours, Exposition des
Races Canines,’ 1865, p. 3.
With respect to wolves burrow-
ing holes, see Richardson, ‘ Fauna
Boreali-Americana,’ p. 64 ; an 1 Bech-
stein, ‘Naturgeschichte Deutsch lands,’
b. i. s. 617.
See Poeppig, ‘ Reise in Chile,
B. i. s. 290 ; Mr. G. Clarke, as above ;
and Rengger, s. 155.
Dogs, ‘Nat. Library,’ vol. x. p.
121 ; an endemic South American dog
seems also to have become feral in this
island. See Gosse’s ‘ Jamaica,’ p. 340.
Low, ‘ Domesticated Auimalo.
p. 650.
Chap. I.
THEIE PAEENTAGE.
29
parent-species. One fact, however, with respect to the colouring of
domestic dogs, I at one time hoped might have thrown some light
on their origin; and it is worth giving,' as showing how colouring
follows laws, even in so anciently and thoroughly domesticated an
animal as the dog. Black dogs with tan-coloured feet, whatever
breed they may belong to, almost invariably have a tan-coloured
spot on the upper and inner corners of each eye, and their lips are
generally thus coloured. I have seen only two exceptions to this
rule, namely, in a spaniel and terrier. Dogs of a light-brown
colour often have a lighter, yellowish-brown spot over the eyes;
sometimes the spot is white, and in a mongrel terrier the spot was-
black. Mr. Waring kindly examined for me a stud of fifteen grey-
hounds in Suffolk : eleven of them were black, or black and white,
or brindled, and these had no eye-spots ; but three were red and
one slaty-blue, and these four had dark-coloured spots over their
eyes. Although the spots thus sometimes differ in colour, they
strongly tend to be tan-coloured ; this is proved by my having seen
four spaniels, a setter, two Yorkshire shepherd dogs, a large
mongrel, and some fox-hounds, coloured black and white, with not
a trace of tan-colour, excepting the spots over the eyes, and some-
times a little on the feet. These latter cases, and many others,
show plainly that the colour of the feet and the eye-spots are in
some way correlated. I have noticed, in various breeds, every
gradation, from the whole face being tan-coloured, to a complete
ring round the eyes, to a minute spot over the inner and upper
corners. The spots occur in various sub-breeds of terriers and
spaniels ; in setters ; in hounds of various kinds, including the
turnspit-like German badger-hound ; in shepherd dogs ; in a
mongrel, of which neither parent had the spots ; in one pure bull-
dog, though the spots were in this case almost white ; and in grey-
Jiounds, — but true black-and-tan greyhounds are excessively rare ;
nevertheless I have been assured by Mr. Warwick, that one ran at
the Caledonian Champion meeting of April 1860, and was marked
precisely like a black-and-tan terrier.” This dog, or another exactly
the same colour, ran at the Scottish National Club on the 21st of
March, 1865 ; and I hear from Mr. C, M. Browne, that “ there was
no reason either on the sire or dam side for the appearance of this
unusual colour.” Mr. Swinhoe at my request looked at the dogs in
China, at Amoy, and he soon noticed a brown dog with yellow
spots over the eyes. Colonel H. Smith figures the magnificent
black mastiff of Thibet with a tan-cbloured stripe over the eyes,
feet, and chaps; and what is more singular, he figures the Alco, or
native domestic dog of Mexico, as black and white, with nariow
tan-coloured rings round the eyes ; at the Exhibition of dogs in
London, May 1863, a so-called forest dog from North-West Mexico
was shown, which had pale tan-coloured spots over the eyes. The
occurrence of these tan-coloured spots in dogs of such extremely
‘ The Naturalist Library,’ Dogs, vol. x. pp. 4, 19.
30
DOGS.
Chak I,
difforcint" breeds, living in various parts of the world, makes the fact
highly remarkable.
We shall hereafter see, especially in the chapter on Pigeons, that
coloured marks are strongl}'^ inherited, and that they often aid us
in discovering the primitive forms of our domestic races. Hence,
if any wild canine species had distinctly exhibited the tan-coloured
B])ots over the eyes, it might have been argued that this was the
parent-form of nearly all our domestic races. But after looking at
many coloured plates, and through the whole collection of skins In
the British Museum, I can find no species thus marked. It is no
doubt possible that some extinct species was thus coloured. On
the other hand, in looking at the various species, there seems to be
a tolerably plain correlation between tan-coloured legs and face;
and less frequently between black legs and a black face ; and this
general rule of colouring explains to a certain extent tlie above-
given cases of correlation between the eye-spots and the colour of
the feet. Moreover, some jackals and foxes have a trace of a white
ring round their eyes, as in (J. mesomelus, C\ aureus, and (judging
from Colonel H. Smith’s drawing) in (\ alopeor, and (J. thaleb.
Other species have a trace of a black line over the corners of the
eyes, as in C. varicgatus, cinereo-variegatus, and fvlvus, and the wild
Dingo. Hence I am inclined to conclude that a tendency for tan-
coloured spots to appear over the eyes in the various breeds of
dogs, is analogous to the case observed by Desmarest, namely, that
when any white appears on a dog the tip of the tail is always white,
“de maniere a rappel er la tache terminate de meme couleur, qui
caracterise la plupart des Canides sauvages.”^^ This rule, however,
as I am assured by Mr. Jesse, does not invariably hold good.
It has been objected that our domestic dogs cannot be
descended from wolves or jackals, because their periods of
gestation are different. The supposed difference rests on
statements made by Buflfon, Gilibert, Bechstein, and others ;
but these are now known to be erroneous ; and the period is
found to agree in the wolf, jackal, and dog, as closely as could
be expected, for it is often in some degree variable.^^ Tessier,
Quoted by Prof. Gervais, ‘ Hist.
Nat. Mamin.,’ tom. ii. p. 66.
J, Hunter shows that the long
period of seventy-three days given by
Buffon is easily explained by the bitch
having received the dog many times
during a period of sixteen days (‘ Phil.
Transact.,’ 1787, p. 353). Hunter
found that the gestation of a mongrel
from wolf and dog (‘Phil. Transact.,’
I7fi9, p. 160) apparently w'as sixty-
three days, for she received the dog
more than once. The period of a
mongrel dog and jackal was tifty-uine
days. Fred. Cuvier found the period
of gestation of the wolf to be (‘ Diet.
Class. d’Hist. Nat.’ tom. iv. p. 8) two
months and a few days, which agrees
with the dog. Isid. G. St.-Hi!aire,
W’ho has discussed the whole subject,
and from whom I quote Bellinger^
states (‘Hist. Nat. Gen,’ tom. iiL p
Chap. I.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
31
who lias closely attended to this subject, allows a difference
of four days in the gestation of the dog. The Eev. W. D.
Fox has given me three carefully recorded cases of retrievers,
in which the bitch was put only once to the dog ; and not
counting this day, but counting that of parturition, the
periods were fifty-nine, sixty-two, and sixty-seven days. The
average period is sixty-three days ; but Bellingeri states that
this applies only to large dogs; and that for small races it
is from sixty to sixty-three days ; Mr. Eyton of Eyton, who
has had much experience with dogs, also informs me that
the time is apt to be longer with large than with small
dogs.
F. Cuvier has objected that the jackal would not have been
domesticated on account of its offensive smell ; but savages are ‘
not sensitive in this respect. The degree of odour, also, differs
in the different kinds of jackal and Colonel H. Smith makes
a sectional division of the group with one character dependent
on not being offensive. On the other hand, dogs — for instance,
rough and smooth terriers — differ much in this respect ; and
M. Godron states that the hairless so-called Turkish dog is
more odoriferous than other dogs. Isidore Geoffrey gave to
a dog the same odour as that from a jackal by feeding it on raw
flesh.
The belief that our dogs are descended from wolves, jackals.
South American Canidae, and other species, suggests a far more
impoi'tant difficulty. These animals in their undomesticated
state, judging from a widely-spread analogy, would have been
in some degree sterile if intercrossed ; and such sterility will
be admitted as almost certain by all those who believe that
the lessened fertility of erossed forms is an infallible criterion
of specific distinctness. Anyhow these animals keep distinct
in the countries which they inhabit in common. On the
other hand, all domestic dogs, which are here supposed to
be descended from several distinct species, are, as far as is
112) that in the Jardin des Plantes ’ ‘Hist. Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii. p. 112, on
the period of the jackal has been the odour of jackals. Col. Ham. Smith,
found to be from sixty to sixty-three m ‘ Nat. Lib.,’ vol. x. p. 289.
lays, exactly as with the dog. Quoted by Quatrefages in ‘ Bull
Sec Isid. Geoffroy St.-Hilaire, Soc. d’Acclimat.,’ May llth, 1868.
32
DOGS.
OliAP. I.
kiK)\vn, miitTiall}'’ fertile together.. But, as Broca has well
remarked, the fertility of successive generations of mongrel
dogs has never been scrutinised with that care Avhich is
thought indispensable when species are crossed. The few
facts leading to the conclusion that the sexual feelings and
reproductive powers differ in the several races of the dog
when crossed are (passing over mere size as rendering pro-
pagation difficult) as follows : the Mexican Alco apparently
dislikes dogs of other kinds, but this perhaps is not strictly a
sexual feeling ; the hairless endemic dog of Paraguay, ac-
cording to Eengger, mixes less with the European races than
these do with each other ; the Spitz dog in Germany is said
to receive the fox more readily than do other breeds ; and Dr.
Hodgkin states that a female Dingo in England attracted the
male wild foxes. If these latter statements can be trusted,
they prove some degree of sexual difference in the breeds of
the dog. But the fact remains that our domestic dogs,
differing so widely as they do in external structure, are far
more fertile together than we have reason to believe their
supposed wild parents would have been, Pallas aS'Umes
that a long course of domestication eliminates that sterility
which the parent-species would have exhibited if only lately
captured ; no distinct facts are recorded in support of this
hypothesis ; but the evidence seems to me so strong (indepen-
dently of the evidence derived’ from other domesticated
animals) in favour of our domestic dogs having descended from
several wild stocks, that I am inclined to admit the truth of
this hypothesis.
There is another and closely allied difficulty consequent on
the doctrine of the descent of our domestic dogs from several
wild species, namely, that they do not seem to be perfectly
fertile with their supposed parents. But the experiment has
not been quite fairly tried ; the Hungarian dog, for instance,
‘Journal de la Physiologie,’ tom.
li. p. 385.
See Mr, E. Hill’s excellent ac-
count of this breed in Gosse’s
‘Jamaica,’ p. 338; Rengger’s ‘ Sauge-
thiere von Paraguay,’ s. 153. With
respect to Spitz dogs, see Bechstein’o
‘Naturgesch. Deutschlands,’ 1801,
B. i. s. 638. With respect to Dr.
Hodgkin’s statement made before
Brit. Assoc., see ‘ The Zoologist,’ vol.
iv., for 1845-^16, p. 1097.
‘Acta Acad. St. Petersburg]),
1780, part ii. pp. 84, 100.
Chap. I.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
33
which in external appearance so closely resembles the Euro-
pean wolf, ought to be crossed with this wolf : and the
pariah dogs of India with Indian wolves and jackals ; and so
in other cases. That the sterility is very slight between
certain dogs and wolves and other Canidee is shown by
savages taking the trouble to cross them. Buffon got four
successive generations from the wolf and dog, and the
mongrels were perfectly fertile together.^® But" more lately
M. Flourens states positively as the result of his numerous
experiments that hybrids from the wolf and dog, crossed
inter se, become sterile at the third generation, and those
from the jackal and dog at the fourth generation.^® But
these animals were closely confined ; and many wild animals,
as we shall see in a future chapter, are rendered by confine-
ment in some degree or even utterly sterile. The Dingo,
which breeds freely in Australia with our imported dogs,
would not breed though repeatedly crossed in the Jardin des
Plantes.®® Some hounds from Central Africa, brought home
by Major Denham, never bred in the Tower of London
and a similar tendeney to sterility might be transmitted to
the hybrid offspring of a wild animal. Moreover, it appears
that in M. Elourens’ experiments the hybrids were closely
bred in and in for three or four generations ; and this cir-
cumstance, would most certainly increase the tendency to
sterility. Several years ago I saw confined in the Zoological
Gardens of London a female hybrid from an English dog
and jackal, which even in this the first generation was so
sterile that, as I was assured by her keeper, she did not fully
48 M. Broca has shown (‘ Journal
cle Physiologic,’ tom. li. p. 353) that*
Button’s experiments have been often
misrepresented. Broca has collected
(pp. 390-395) many facts on the
fertility of crossed dogs, wolves, and
jackals.
49 ‘ Be la Longevite llumaine,’ par
M. Flourens, 1855, p. 143. Mr. Blyth
says (‘ Indian Sporting Review,’ vol.
ii. p. 137) that he has seen in India
several hybrids fro-m the pariah-dog
and jackal ; and between one of these
hybrids and a terrier. The experi-
ments of Hunter on the jackal arc
well-known. See also Isid. Geoffroy
St.-Hilaire, ‘ Hist. Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii.
p. 217, who speaks of the hybrid off-
spring of the jackal as perfectly fer-
tile for three generations.
50 On ^ authority of F. Cuvier,
quoted in Bronn's ‘ Geschichte der
Natur,’ B. ii. s. 164.
54 W. C. L. Martin, ‘ History of the
■Dog,’ 1845, p. 203. Mr. Philip P.
King, after ample opportunities of
observation, informs me that the
Dingo and European dogs often cross
in Australia.
u
DOGS.
CnAP. I.
exDiLit her proper periods ; but this case was certainly
exceptional, as numerons instances have occurred of fertile
hybrids from these two animals. In almost all experiments
on tlio crossing of animals there are so many causes of doubt,
(hat it is extremely difficult to come to any positive con-
clusion. It would, however, appear, that those who belioA^e
that our dogs are descended from several species will have
n(>t only to admit that their offspring after a long course of
domestication generally lose all tendency to sterility when
crossed together ; but that between certain breeds of dogs and
some of their supposed aboriginal parents a certain degree of
sterility has been retained or possibly even acquired.
]\ otwithstanding the difficulties in regard to fertility
given in the last two paragraphs, when we reflect on the
inherent improbability of man having domesticated through-
out the world one single species alone of so widely distributed,
so easily tamed, and so useful a group as the CanideC ; when
we reflect on the extreme antiquity of the different breeds ;
and especially when we reflect on the close similarity, both
in external structure and habits, between the domestic dogs
of various countries and the wild species still inhabiting
these same countries, the balance of evidence is strongly in
favour of the multiple origin of our dogs.
Differences between the several Breeds of the Dog. — If the
several breeds have descended from several wild stoclcs, their
difference can obviously in part be explained by that of their
parent species. For instance, the form of the greyhound
may be partly accounted for by descent from some such
animal as the slim Abyssinian Canis simensis,^"^ with its
elongated muzzle ; that of the larger dogs from the larger
wolves, and the smaller and slighter dogs from the jackals :
and thus perhaps we may account for certain constitutional
and climatal differences. But it would be a great error
to suppose that there has not been in addition a large
52 Ruppcl, ‘ Neue Wirbelthiere von
Abyssinien,’ 1835-40 ; ‘ Mammif.,’ s.
39, pi. xLv. There is a specimen
of tins fine animal in the British
Museum.
53 Even Pallas admits this ; see
‘Act. Acad. St. Petersburgh,’ 1780,
p. 93.
Chap. I.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
35
ainovmt of variation. The intercrossing of the several
aboriginal wild stock-!, and of the subsequently formed races,
has probably increa-ed the total number of breeds, and, as
we shall presently see, has greatly modified some of them.
But wo cannot explain by crossing the origin of such extremo
forms as thoroughbred greyhounds, bloodhounds, bulldogs,
Blenheim spaniels, terriers, pugs, &c., unless we believe that
forms equally or more strongly characterised in these different
respects once existed in nature. But hardly any one has
been bold enough to suppose that such unnatural forms ever
did or could exist in a wild state. When compared with all
known members of the family of CanidcU they betray a
distinct and abnormal origin. No instance is on record of
such dogs as bloodhounds, spaniels, true greyhounds having
been kept by savages : they are the product of long-continued
civilization.
The miraber of breeds and sub-breeds of the dog is great ; Youatt
for instance, describes twelve kinds of greyhounds. I will not
attempt to enumerate or describe the varieties, for we cannot dis-
criminate how much of their difference is due to variation, and
how much to descent from different aboriginal stocks. But it may
be worth while briefly to mention some points. Commencing with
the skull, Cuvier has admitted that in form the differences are
“ plus fortes que cedes d’aucunes especes sauvages d’un meme
genre naturel.” The proportions of the different bones ; the curva-
ture of the lower jaw, the position of the condyles with respect to
the plane of the teeth (on which F. Cuvier founded his classification),
and in mastiffs the shape of its posterior branch ; the shape of the
zygomatic arch, and of the temporal fossae; the position of the
occiput— all vary considerably.®^ The difference in size between
the brains of dogs belonging to large and small breeds is some-
thing prodigious ” “ Some dogs’ brains are high and rounded,
while others are low, long, and narrow in front.” In the latter,
“ the olfactory lobes are visible for about half their extent, when
the brain is seen from above, but they are wholly concealed by the
hemispheres in other breeds.”®® The dog has properly six pairs of
molar teeth in the upper jaw, and seven in the lower ; but several
Quoted by I. Geoffroy, ‘Hist.
Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii. p. 4.53.
F. Cuvier, in ‘Annales du
Huseiim,’ tom. xviii. p. 337 ; Godron,
‘ De I’Espeee,’ tom. i. p. 342 ; and
Col. H. Smith, in ‘ Nat. Library,’
vol. ix. p. 101. See also some
observations on the degeneracy of
the skull in certain breeds, by Prof.
Bianconi, ‘ La Theorie Darwinienne,*
1874, p. 279.
Dr. Burt Wilder, ‘American
Assoc. Advancement of Science,’ 1873
pp. 236, 239.
sa
DOGS.
Chap. I.
iKitr.ralista liavG seen not rarely an additional pair in the upper
jaw and Professor Gervais says that there are dogs “qni ont
sept paires de dents siiperieures et hnit inferienres.” De Blain-
ville'^^ has given full particulars on the frequency of these deviations
in the number of the teeth, and has shown that it is not always tlm
same tooth which is supernnmerary. In short-muzzled races,
according to H. Muller/'''’ the molar teeth stand obliquely, whilst
in long-muzzled races they are placed longitudinally, with open
spac'es between them. Tlie naked, so-called Egyptian or Turkish
dog is extremely deficient in its teeth,®® — sometimes having none
except one molar on each side ; but this, though characteristic of
the breed, must be considered as a monstrosity. M. Girard,®^ who
seems to have attended closely to the subject, says that the period
of the appearance of the permanent teeth differs in different dogs,
being earlier in large dogs ; thus the mastiff assumes its adult teeth
iu four or five months, whilst in the spaniel the period is sometimes
more than seven or eight months. On the other hand small dogs
are mature, and the females have arrived at the best age for
breeding, when one year old, whereas large dogs are still in their
puppyhood at this time, and take fully twice as long to develop
their proportions.’’®^
With respect to minor differences little need be said. Isidore
Geoffroy has shown ®^ that in size some dogs are six times as long
(the tail being excluded) as others ; and that the height relatively
to the length of the body varies from between one to two, and one
to nearly four. In the Scotch deer-hound there is a striking and
remarkable difference in the size of the male and female.®^ Every
one knows how the ears vary in size in different breeds, and with
their great development their muscles become atrophied. Certain
breeds of dogs are described as having a deep furrow between the
nostrils and lips. The caudal vertebrje, according to F. Cuvier,
on whose authority the two last statements rest, vary in number ;
and the tail in English cattle and some shepherd dogs is almost
absent. The mammse vary from seven to ten in number ; Dauben-
ton, having examined twenty-one dogs, found eight with five
mammae on each side; eight with four on each side; aed the others
5’’ Isid. Geoffroy Saint-IIilaire,
‘ Hist, des Anomalies,’ 1832, tom. i.
p. 660, Gervais, ‘Hist. Nat. des
Mammifercs,’ tom. ii., 1S5&, p.'06. De
Blainville (‘ Osteographie, Canidte,’
p. 137) has also seen an extra molar
on both sides.
68 ‘ Osteographie, Canid®,’ p. 137.
69 Wilrzburger, ‘Mcdecin. Zeit-
schrift,’ 1860, B. i. s. 265.
60 Mr. Yarrell, in ‘ Proc. Zoolog.
Soc.,’ Oct. 8th, 1833. Mr. Water-
house showed me a skull of one of
these dogs, which had only a single
molar on each side and some imper-
fect incisors.
61 Quoted in ‘ The Ycterinary,’
London, vol. viii. p. 415.
62 This is quoted from JStonoIiengc,
a great authority, ‘ The Doa^,’ 1867,
p. 187.
63 ‘ Hist. Nat. Gemiral,’ tom. iii. p. -
448.
64 W. Scrope, ‘ Art of Dccr-Stalk-
ing,’ p. 354.
Chap. I.
THEIK PARENTAGE.
37
with an nnequal number on the two sides.®^ Dogs have properly
five toes in front and four behind, hut a fifth toe is often added ;
and F. Cuvier states that, when a fifth toe is present, a fourtli
cuneiform t)one is developed ; and, in this case, sometimes the great
cuneiform bone is raised, and gives on its inner side a large arti-
cular surface to the astragalus ; so that even the relative connection
of the bones, the most constant of all characters, varies. These
modifications, however, in the feet of dogs are not important,
because they ought to be ranked, as De Blainville has shown,®® as
monstrosities. Nevertheless they are interesting from being corre-
lated with tlie size of the body, for they occur much more frequently
with mastiffs and other large breeds than with small dogs. Closely
allied varieties, however, sometimes differ in this respect; thus
Mr. Hodgson states that the black- and- tan Lassa variety of the
Thibet mastiff has the fifth digit, whilst the Mustang sub- variety
is not thus characterised. The extent to which the skin is developed
between the tees varies much ; but we shall return to this point.
The degree to which the various breeds differ in the perfection of
their senses, dispositions, and inherited habits is notorious to every
one. The breeds present some constitutional differences : the pulse,
says Youatt,®'^ varies materially according to the breed, as well as
to the size of the animal.” Different breeds of dogs are subject
in different degrees to various diseases. They certainly become
adapted to different climates under which they have long existed.
It is notorious that most of our best European breeds deteriorate
in India.®® The Rev E. Everest®® believes that no one has succeeded
in keeping the Newfoundland dog long alive in India; so it is,
according to Lichtenstein,''® even at the Cape of Good Hope. The
Thibet mastiff degenerates on the plains of India, and can live only
on the mountains.^^ Lloyd asserts that our bloodhounds and
bulldogs have been tried, and cannot withstand the cold of the
northern European forests. *
Seeing in how many characters the races of the dog differ
Quoted by Col. Ham. Smith in
‘ Nat. Lib.,’ vol. x. p. 79.
De Blainville, ‘ Osteographie,
Canidae,’ p. 134. F. Cuvier, ‘ Annales
du IMuseum.’ tom. xviii. p. 342. In
regard to mastiffs, see Col. H. Smith,
‘Nat. Lib.’ vol. x. p. 218. For the
Thibet mastiff, see Mr. Hodgson in
‘ Journal of As. Soc. of Bengal,’ vol. i.,
1832, p. 342. *
‘The Dog,’ 1845, p. 186. With
respect to diseases, Youatt asserts (p.
167) that the Italian greyhound is
'‘strongly subject ” to i>olypi in the
matrix or vagina. The spaniel and
chocele. The liability to distemper
(p. 232) is extremely different in dif-
ferent breeds. On the distemper, s e
also Col. Hutchinson on ‘Dog Break-
ing,’ 1850, p. 279.
See Youatt on the Dog, p. 15;
‘The Veterinary,’ London, vol. xi. p.
235.
‘ Journal of As. Soc. of Bengal,’
vol. iii. p. 19.
‘ Travels,’ vol. ii. p. 15.
Hodgson, in ‘Journal of As. Soc.
of Bengal,’ vol. i. p. 342.
‘ Field Sports of tho North or
Europe,’ vol li. p. 165.
38
DOGS.
Chap. I.
Troin each other, and remembering Cuvier’s admission that
tlieir skulls differ more than do those of the species of any
natural genus, and bearing in mind how closely the bones of
wolves, jackals, foxes, and other Canidae agree, it is remark-
able that we meet with the statement, repeated over and
over again, that the races of the dog differ in no important
( haracters. A highly competent judge. Prof. Gervais,”^^
udinit-i “i<i Ton prenait sans controle les alterations doiit
chacun de ces organes est susceptible, on poutrait croire qu’il
y a entre les chiens domestiques des differences plus grandes
que ee les qui separent ailleurs les especes, quelquefois meine
les genres.” Some of the differences above enumerated are
in one respect of comparatively little value, for they are not
characteristic of distinct breeds : no one pretends that such
is the case witli the additional molar teeth or with the number
of mammae ; the additional digit is generally present with
mastiffs, and some of the more important differences in the
skull and lower jaw are more or less characteristic of various
breeds. But we must not forget that the predominant power
of selection has not been applied in any of these cases; we
have variability in important parts, but the differences have
not been fixed by selection. Man cares for the form and
fleetne s of his greyhound'’, for the size of his mastiffs, and
formerly for the strength of the jaw in his bulldogs, Ac. ;
but he cares nothing about the number of their molar teeth
or mammae or digits ; nor do we know that differences in
these organs are correlated with. Tor owe their development
to, differences in other parts of the body about which man
does care, 'i'hose who have attended to the subject of
selection will admit that, nature having given variability,
man, if he so chose, could fix five toes to the hinder feet of
certain breeds of dogs, as certainly as to the feet of his
Dorking fowls: he could probably fix, but with much more
difficulty, an additional pair of molar teeth in either jaw, in
the same way as he has given additional horns to certain
breeds of sheep ; if he wished to produce a toothless breed of
dogs, having the so called Turkish dog with its imperfect
‘ Hist. Nat. des Mammif.,’ 1855, tom. ii. pp. 66, 67.
CiiAr I.
THEIR -PARENTAGE.
39
teeth to work on, he conld probably do so, for he Las
succeeded in making hornless breeds of cattle and sheep.
A\ ith respect to the precise causes and steps by which the
several races of dogs have come to differ so greatly from each
other, we are, as in most other cases, profoundly ignorant. We
may attribute part of the difference in external form and con-
stitution to inheritance from distinct wild stocks, that is to
changes effected under nature before domestication. We must
attribute something to the crossing of the several domestic
and natural races. I shall, however, soon recur to the crossing
of races. We have already seen how often savages cross their
dogs with wild native species ; and Pennant gives a curious
account of the manner in which Fochabers, in Scotland, was
stocked “ with a multitude of curs of a most wolfish aspect ”
from a single hybrid- wolf brought into that district.
It would appear that climate to a certain extent directly
modifies the forms of dogs. We have lately seen that several
of our English breeds cannot live in India, and it is positively
asserted that when bred there for a few generations they
degenerate not onty in their mental faculties, but in form.
Captain Williamson,’'^ who carefully attended to this subject,
states that “ hounds are the most rapid in their decline
“ greyhounds and pointers, also, rapidly decline.” But
spaniels, after eight or nine generations, and rvithout a cross
from Europe, are as good as their ancestors. Ur. Falconer
informs me that bulldogs, which have been knoNyn, when
first brought into the country, to pin down even an elejDhant
by its trunk, not only fall off after two or three generations
in pluck and ferocity, but lose the under-hung character
of their lower jaws ; their muzzles become finer and their
bodies lighter. English dogs imported into India are so
valuable that probably due care has been taken to prevent
their ci ossiug with native dogs ; so that the deterioration
cannot be thus accounted for. The Kev. E. Everest informs
me that he obtained a pair of setters, born in India, which
perfectly resembled their Scotch parents : he raised several
litters from them in Delhi, taking the most stringent
” ‘History of Quadrupeds,’ 1793, ‘Oriental Field Sports,’ quoted
vol. i. p. 238. by Youatt, ‘The Dog,’ p. 16.
40
DOGS.
Chap. I.
precautions to prevent a cross, but he never succeeded, though
this was only the second generation in India, in obtaining
a single young dog like its parents in size or make; their
nostrils were more contracted, their noses more pointed, their
size inferior, and their limbs more slender. So again on tiie
coast of Guinea, dogs, according to Bosman, “ alter strangel}^ ;
their ears grow long and stiff like those of foxes, to whicli
colour they also incline, so that in three or four years, they
degenerate into very ugly creatures; and in thiee or four
broods their barking turns into a howl.” This remarkable
tendency to rapid deterioration in European dogs subjected
to the climate of India and Africa, may be largely accounted
for by reversion to a primordial condition which many animals
exhibit, as we shall hereafter see, when their constitutions
are in any way disturbed.
Some of the peculiarities characteristic of the scA’eral breeds
of the dog have probably arisen suddenly, and, though strictl}^
inherited, maybe called monstrosities ; for instance, the shape
of the legs and body in the turnspit of Europe and India ;
the shape of the head and the under-hanging jaw in the bull-
and pug-dog, so alike in this one respect and so unlike in all
others. A peculiarity suddenly arising, and therefore in one
sense deserving to be called a monstrosity, may, however, be
increased and fixed by man’s selection. We can hardly doubt
that long-continued training, as with the greyhound in
coursing hares, as with water-dogs in swimming — and the
want of exercise, in the case of lapdogs — must have produced
some direct effect on theit structure and instincts. But we
shall immediately see that the most potent cause of change
has probably been the selection, both methodical and uncon-
scious, of slight individual differences, — the latter kind of
selection resulting from the occasional preservation, during
hundreds of generations, of those individual dogs which were
the most useful to man for certain purposes and under certain
conditions of life. In a future chapter on Selection I shall
show that even barbarians attend closely to the qualities of
their clogs. This unconscious selection by man would be aided
78 A. Murray gives this passage in his ‘ Geographical Distribution of Mam-
mals,’ 4to, 18GG, p. 8.
CiiAi'. L
THEIR PARENTAGE.
41
by a kind of natural selection ; for the dogs of savages have
])aitly to gain iheir own subsistence: for instance, in Aus-
tralia, as we hear from Mr. Nind,^'^ the dogs are sometimes
compelled by want to leave their masters and provide for
themselves ; but in a few days they generally return. And
we may infer that dogs of different shapes, sizes, and habits,
M'ould have the best chance of surviving under different
circumstances, — on open sterile plains, where they have to
run down their own prey, — on rocky coasts, where they have
to feed on crabs and fish left in the tidal pools, as in the case
oi‘ New Guinea and Tierra del Fuego. In this latter country,
as I am informed by Mr. Bridges, the Catechist to the Mission,
the dogs turn over the stones on the shore to catch the crus-
taceans which lie beneath, and they “ are clever enough to
knock off the shell-fish at a first blow for if this be not
done, shelhfish are well known to have an almost invincible
power of adhesion.
It has already been remarked that dogs differ in the degree
to which their feet are webbed. Imdogs of the Newfoundland
breed, which are eminently aquatic in their habits, the skin,
according to Isidore Geoffrey, extends to the third phalanges
whilst in ordinary dogs it extends only to the second. In
two Newfoundland dogs which I examined, when the toes
were stretched apart and viewed on the under side, the skin
extended in a nearly straight line between the outer margins
of the balls of the toes ; whereas, in two terriers of distinct
sub-breeds, the skin viewed in the same manner was deeply
scooped out. In Canada there is a dog which is peculiar P.
the country and common there, and this has “ half-webbed
feet and is fond of the water.” English otter-hounds are
said to have webbed feet : a friend examined for me the feet
of two, in comparison with the feet of some harriers and
bloodhounds ; he found the skin variable in extent in all, but
more dex eloped in the otter-hounds than in the others.^*^ As
Quoted by Mr. Galton, ‘ Domes-
tication of Animals,’ p. 13.
78 ‘Hist. Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii. p. 450.
79 Mr. Grcenliow on the Canadian
Dog, in Loudon’s ‘ Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’
vol. vi., 1833, p. 611.
80 See Mr. C. O. Groom-Napier on
the webbing of the hind feet of Otter-
hounds, in ‘ Land and W ater,’ Oct.
13th, ISGG, p. 270.
42
DOGS.
Ohai' I.
aquatic animals which belong to quite different orders have
webbed feet, there can be no doubt that tliis structure would
be serviceable to dogs that frequent the water. We may
conlidently infer that no man ever selected his water-dogs
by the extent to which the skin was developed between their
'toes ; but what he does, is to preserve and breed from those
individuals which hunt best in the water, or best retrieve
wounded game, and thus he unconsciously selects dogs with
feet slightly better webbed. The effects of use from the
fi-e(}uent stretching apart of the toes will likewise aid in the
result. Man thus closely imitates Natural Selection. We
hax’o an excellent illustration ol* this same process in North
America, where, according to Sir J. Eichardson,®^ all the
wolves, foxes, and aboriginal domestic dogs have their feet
broader than in the corresponding species of the Old World,
and “well calculated for running on the snow.” Now, in
these Arctic regions, the life or death of every animal will
often depend on its success in hunting over the snow when
soft ; and this will in pgftff depend on the feet being broad ;
yet they must not be so broad as to interfere with the activity
of the animal when the ground is sticky, or with its power
of burrowing holes, or with other necessary habits of life.
As changes in domestic breeds which take place so slowly
are not to be noticed at any one period, whether due to the
selection of individual variations or of differences resulting
from crosses, are most important in understanding the origin
of our domestic productions, and likewise in throwing indirect
light on the changes effected under nature, I will give in detail
such cases as I have been able to collect. Lawrence, who
paid particular attention to the history of the foxhound,
fvriting in 1829, says that between eighty and ninety years
Defore “ an entirely new foxhound was raised through the
oreeder’s art,” the ears of the old southern hound being
i-educed, the bone and bulk lightened, the waist increased in
length, and the stature somewhat added to. It is believed
that this was effected by a cross with a greyhound. With
‘The Horse in all his Varieties^
&c., 1829, i>p. 230, 234.
** ‘Fauna Bor eali-Americaua,’
1829, p. 62.
Chap. L
THEIR PARENTAGE.
43
respect to this latter dog, Youatt,®^ who is generally cautions
in his statements, says that the greyhound within the last
fifty jmars, that is before the commencement of the present
century, “ assumed a somewhat different character from that
which ho once possessed. He is now distinguished by a
beautiful symmetry of form, of which he could not once
boast, and he has even superior speed to that which he
formerly exhibited. He is no longer used to struggle with
deer, but contends with his fellows over a shorter and
speedier course.” An able writer believes that our English
greyhounds are the descendants, progressively improved, of the
large rough gre3diounds which existed in Scotland so early
as the third century. A cross at some former period with
the Italian greyhound has been suspected ; but this seems
hardly probable, considering the feebleness of this latter
breed. Lord Orford, as is well known, crossed his famous
greyhounds, which failed in courage, with a bulldog — this
breed being chosen from being erroneously supposed to be
deficient in the power of scent ; “ after the sixth or seventh
generation,” says Youatt, “ there was not a vestige left of
the form of the bulldog, but his courage and indomitable
perseverance remained.”
Youatt infers, from a comparison of an old picture of King
Charles’s spaniels with the living dog, that “ the breed of the
present day is materially altered for the worse ;” the muzzle
has become shorter, the forehead more prominent, and the eyes
larger ; the changes in this case have probably been due to
simple selection. The setter, as this author remarks in another
place, “ is evidently the large spaniel improved to his present
peculiar size and beauty, and taught another way of marking
his game. If the form of the dog were not sufficiently satis-
factory on this point, we might have recourse to history ; ”
he then refers to a document dated 1685 bearing on this
subject; and adds that the pure Irish setter shows no signs
of a cross with the pointer, which some authors suspect
has been the case with the English setter. The bulldog is an
‘The Dog,’ 1845, pp. 31, 35; In the ‘Encyclop. of Rural
with respect to King Charles’s spaniel, Sports,’ p. 557 ,
p. 45 ; for tltc setter, p. 90.
44
DOGS.
Chap. 1
Englivsh breed, and as I hear from Mr. G. E. Jesse, seems to
have originated from the mastiff since the time of Shakspearo ;
but certainly existed in 1G31, as shown by Prestwick Eaton's
letters. There can be no doubt that the fancy bulldogs of
the present day, now that they are not used for bull-baiting,
have become greatly reduced in size, without any express
intention on the part of the breeder. Our pointers are
certainly descended from a Spanish breed, as even their
present names, Eon, Ponto, Carlos, itc., show ; it is said that
they were not known in England before the Eevolutioii in
1688;®*" but the breed since its introduction has been much
modified, for Mr. Borrow, who is a sportsman and knows
Spain intimately well, informs me that he has not seen in
that country any breed “corresponding in figure with the
English pointer ; but there are genuine pointers near Xeres
which have been imported by English gentlemen.” A nearly
parallel case is offered by the Newfoundland dog, which was
certainly brought into England from that country, but which
has since been so much modified that, as several writers have
observed, it does not now closely resemble any existing native
dog in Newfoundland.^'^
These several cases of slow and gradual changes in our
English dogs possess some interest ; for though the changes
have generally, but not invariably, been caused by one or
two crosses with a distinct breed, yet we may feel sure, from
the well-known extreme variability of crossed breeds, that
rigorous and long-continued selection must have been prac-
tised, in order to improve them in a definite manner. As
soon as any strain or family became slightly improved or
better adapted to alter circumstances, it would tend to
supplant the older and less improved strains. For instance,
as soon as the old foxhound was improved by a cross with the
greyhound, or by simple selection, and assumed its present
Author of ‘ Researches into the
History of the British Dog.
See Col. Hamilton Smith on the
iiitiijaity of the Pointer, in ‘Nat. Lib.’
vol. X. p. 196.
The Newfoundland dog is be-
i«vcd to Lave originated from a cross
between the Esquimaux dog and a
large French hound. See Dr. Hodgkin,
‘Brit. Assoc.,’ 1844; Bechsteiu’s
‘Naturgesch. Deutschland,’ Band., i.
s. 574 ; ‘ Nat. Lib,,’ vol. x. p. 132 ; also
Mr. Jukes’ ‘ Excursion in and abou*,
Newfoundland.’
CnAr. I.
THE IK PARENTAGE.
45
rsharacter— and the change was probably desired owing to
the increased fleetness of onr hunters— it rapidly spread
thronghont the country, and is now everywhere nearly
uniform. But the process of improvement is still going on
for CA’ery one tries to improve his strain by occasionally
procuring dogs from the best kennels. Through this process
of gradual substitution the old English hound has been lost ;
and so it has been with the Irish wolf-dog, the old English
bulldog, and several other breeds, such as the alaunt, as I am
informed by Mr. Jesse. But the extinction of former breeds
is apparently aided by another cause ; for whenever a breed
is kept in scanty numbers, as at present with the bloodhound,
it is reared with some difficulty, apparently from the evil
effects of long-continued close interbreeding. As several
breeds of the dog have been slightly but sensibly modified
within so short a period as the last one or two centuries, by
the selection of the best individuals, modified in many cases
by crosses with other breeds ; and as we shall hereafter see
that the breeding of dogs was attended to in ancient times,
as it still is by savages, we may conclude that we have in
selection, even if only occasionally practised, a potent means
of mod ideation.
Domestic Cats.
Cats have been domesticated in the East from an ancient
period ; Mr. Blyth informs me that they are mentioned in a
Sanskrit writing 2000 years old, and in Egypt their antiquity
is known to be even greater, as shown by monumental draw-
ings and their mummied bodies. These mummies, according
to De Blainville,^^ who has particularly studied the subject,
belong to no less than three species, namely, F. caligulatd,
huhastes, and cliaus. The two former species are said to bo
still found, both wild and domesticated, in parts of Egypt.
F. caligulata presents a difference in the first inferior milk
molar tooth, as compared with the domestic cats of Europe,
which makes De Blainville conclude that it is not one of the
88 De Blainville, ‘ Ostcographie, other mummied species. He quotes
Felis,’ p. 65, on the character of F. Ehrenburg on F. rnaniculata being
califjulata; pp. 85, 89, 90, 175, on the mummied.
46
DOMESTIC CATS.
Chap. 1.
pn, rent-forms of our cats. Several naturalists, as Pallas,
Temminck, Blytli, believe that domestic cats are the descend-
ants of t-everal species commingled : it is certain that cats
cross readily with various wild species, and it would appear
that the character of the domestic breeds has, at least in some
'cases, been thus affected. Sir W. Jardine has no doubt that,
“ in the north of Scotland, there has been occasional crossing
with our native species (F. sylvesiris), and that the result of
these crosses has been kept in our houses. I have seen,” he
adds, “ many cats very closely resembling the wild cat, and
one or two that could scarcely be distinguished from it.” Mr.
Blyth remarks on this passage, “ but such cats are never
seen in the southern parts of England; still, as compared
with any Indian tame cat, the affinity of the ordinary British
cat to F. sylvestris is manifest ; and due I suspect to frequent
intermixture at a time when the tame cat was first introduced
into Britain and continued rare, while the wild species was
far more abundant than at present.” In Hungary, Jeitteles
was assured on trustworthy authority that a wild male cat
crossed with a female domestic cat, and that the hybrids long
lived in a domesticated state. In Algiers the domestic cat
has crossed with the wild cat (E. lyhica) of that countiy.^^
In South Africa as Mr. E. Layard informs me, the domestic
cat intermingles freely with the wild F. caffra ; he has seen
a pair of hybrids which were quite tame and particularly
attached to the lady who brought them up ; and Mr. Fry has
found that these hybrids are fertile. In India the domestic
cat, according to Mr. Blyth, has crossed with four Indian species.
With respect to one of these species, F. chaus, aii excellent
observer. Sir W. Elliot, informs me that he once killed,
near Madras, a wild brood, which were evidently hybrids
from the domestic cat ; these young animals had a -thick
lynx-like tail and the broad brown bar on the inside of the
foreai'in characteristic of F. chaus. Sir W. Elliot adds that he
Asiatic Soc. of Calcutta ; Cura- this Report a very interesting discus-
toi’s Report, Aug. 1856. The passage sion on their origim.
from Sir W. Jardine is quoted from ‘ Fauna Hungarias Sup.,’ i.862,
this Report. Mr. Blyth, who has 3. 12.
“specially attended to the wild and Isid. GeofFroy Saint - Hilaire,
domestic cats of India, has given in ‘ Hist. Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii. p. 177.
CF\r. I.
THEIE VAEIATION.
47
has often observed this same mark on the forearms of domestic
cats in India. Mr. Blyth states that domestic cats coloured
nearly like F. chaus, but not resembling that species in shape,
abound in Bengal ; he adds, “ such a colouration is utterly
unknown in European cats, and the proper tabby markings
(pale streaks on a black ground, peculiarly and symmetrically
disposed), so common in English cats, are never seen in those
of India.” Dr. D. Short has assured Mr. Blyth that, at
Hansi, hybrids between the common cat and F. ornata (or
torquaia) occur, “ and that many of the domestic cats of that
part of India were undistinguishable from the wild F. ornata^
Azara states, but only on the authority of the inhabitants,
that in Paraguay the cat has crossed with two native species.
From these several cases we see that in Europe, Asia, Africa,
and America, the common cat, which lives a freer life than
most other domesticated animals, has crossed with various
wild species ; and that in some instances the crossing has
been sufficiently frequent to affect the character of the
breed.
Whether domestic cats have descended from several distinct
species, or have only been modified by occasional crosses, their
fertility, as far as is known, is unimpaired. The large Angora
or Persian cat is the most distinct in structure and habits
of all the domestic breeds ; and is believed by Pallas, but on
no distinct evidence, to be descended from the F. manul of
middle Asia ; and I am assured by Mr. Blyth that the Angora
cat breeds freely with Indian cats, which, as we have already
seen, ha\ e apparently been much crossed with F. chaus. In
England half-bred Angora cats are perfectly fertile with one
another.
WTthin the same country we do not meet with distinct
races of the cat, as we do of dogs and of most other domestic
animals ; though the cats of the same country present a con-
siderable amount of fluctuating variability. The explanation
obviously is that, from their 'nocturnal and rambling habits,
jni discriminate crossing cannot without much trouble be pre-
vented. Selection cannot be brought into play to produce
distinct breeds, or to keep those distinct which have been
‘Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ 1863, p. 184.
48
DOMESTIC CATS.
CUAV. I
imported from foreign lands. On the other hand, in islands
and in countries completely separated from each other, we
meet with breeds more or less distinct ; and these cases are
worth giving, showing that the scarcity of distinct races in
tlie same country is not caused by a deficiency of variability
in 'the animal. The tailless cats of the Isle of Man are said
to differ from common cats not only in the want of a tail, but
in the greater length of their hind legs, in the size of their
heads, and in habits. The Creole cat of Antigua, as I am
informed by Mr. Nicholson, is smaller, and has a more elon-
gated head, than the British cat. In Ceylon, as Mr. Thwaites
writes to me, ever 3^ one at first notices the different appear-
ance of the native cat from the English animal ; it is of small
size, with closely lying hairs ; its head is small, with a re-
ceding forehead ; but the ears are large and sharp ; altogether
it has what is there called a “ low-caste ” appearance. Eeng-
ger says that the domestic cat, which has been bred for
300 years in Paraguay, presents a striking difference from the
European cat ; it is smaller by a fourth, has a more lanky
body, its hair is short, shining, scanty, and lies close, espe-
cially on the tail : he adds that the change has been less at
Ascension, the capital of Paraguay, owing to the continual
crossing with newly imported cats; and this fact well illus-
trates the importance of separation. The conditions of life
in Paraguay appear not to be highly favourable to the cat,
for, though tho}^ have run half- wild, they do not become
thoroughly feral, like so many other European animals. In
another part of South America, according to Poulin,®^ the
introduced cat has lost the habit of uttering its hideous
nocturnal howl. The Eev. W. D. Fox purchased a cat in
Portsmouth, which he was told came from the coast "of
Guinea ; its skin was black and wrinkled, fur bluish grey
and short, its ears rather bare, legs long, and whole aspect
peculiar. This “negro” cat was fertile wuth common cats.
On the opposite coast of Africa, at Mombas, Captain Ow’en,
93 ‘ Saufjethicre von Paraguay,’ Savans: Acad, Koy. des Sciences,’
1830, s. 212. " tom. vi. p. 34(5. Gomara first noticed
94 ‘ Mem. presentes par divers this fact in 1554.
Chap. I.
TEEIR VARIATION.
49
states that all the cats are covered with short stiff
hair instead of fur : he gives a curious account of a cat from
Algoa Bay, which had been kept for some time on board and
could be identified with certainty ; this animal was left for
only eight weeks at Mombas, but during that short period it
“ underwent a complete metamorphosis, having parted with
its sandy-coloured fur.” A cat from the Cape of Good Hope
has been described by Desmarest as remarkable from a red
stripe extending along the whole length of its back. Through-
out an immense area, namely, the Malayan archipelago, Siam,
Pegu, and Burmah, all the cats have truncated tails about
half the proper length,^*^ often with a sort of knot at the end.
In the Caroline archipelago the cats have very long legs, and
are of a reddish-yellow colour.®'^ In China a breed has droop-
ing ears. At Tobolsk, according to Gmelin, there is a red-
coloured breed. In Asia, also, we find the well-known Angora
or Persian breed.
The domestic cat has run wild in several countries, and
everywhere assumes, as far as can be judged b^^ the short
recorded descriptions, a uniform character. Near Maldonado,
in La Plata, I shot one which seemed perfectly wild ; it was
carefully examined by Mr. Waterhouse,^^ who found nothing
remarkable in it, excepting its great size. In New Zealand
according to Dieffenbach, the feral cats assume a streaky grey
colour like that of wild cats ; and this is the case with the
lialf-wild cats of the Scotch Highlands.
We have seen that distant -countries possess distinct
domestic races of the cat. The differences may be in part
due to descent from several aboriginal species, or at least to
crosses with them. In some cases, as in Paraguay, Mombas,
and Antigua, the differences seem due to the direct action of
different conditions of life. In other cases some slight effect
may possibly be attributed to natural selection, as cats in
95 ‘ Narrative of Voyages,’ vol. ii.
p. 180.
J. Crawfurd, ‘ Descript. Diet, of
th-e Indian Islands,’ p. 255. The
Madagascar cat is said to have a
twi.sted tail ; see Desmarest, in ‘ En-
cyclop. Nat. Mamm.,’ 1820, p. 233,
for some of the other breeds.
5
Admiral Lutke’s Voyage, vol.
iii. p. 308.
‘Zoology of the Voyage of the
Beagle, Mammalia,’ p. 20. Dieffen-
bach, ‘Travels in New Zealand, vol.
ii. p. 185. Ch. St. John, ‘Wild Sports
of the Highlands,’ 1846, p. 40.
50
DOMESTIC CATS.
CllAl’. I
many cases have largely to support themselves and to escape
diverse dangers. But man, owing to the difficulty of pairing
cats, has done nothing by methodical selection ; and probably
very little by unintentional selection ; though in eacli littei
he generally saves the prettiest, and values most a good breed
of mouse- or rat-catchers. Those cats which have a strong
tendency to prowl after game, generally get destroyed by
traps. As cats are so much petted, a breed bearing the same
relation to other cats, that lapdogs bear to larger dogs, would
have been much valued ; and if selection could have been
applied, we should certainly have had many breeds in each
long-civilized country, for there is plenty of variability to
work upon.
We see in this country considerable diversity in size, some
in the proportions of the body, and extreme variability in
colouring. I have only lately attended to this subject, but
have already heard of some singular cases of variation ; one
of a cat born in the West Indies toothless, and remaining so
all its life. Mr. Tegetmeier has shown me the skull of a
female cat with its canines so much developed that they
protruded uncovered beyond the lips; the tooth with the
fang being '95, and the part projecting from the gum *6 of
an inch in length. I have heard of several families of six-
toed cats, in one of which the peculiarity had been trans-
mitted for at least three generations. The tail varies greatly
in length ; I have seen a cat which always carried its tail
flat on its back when pleased. The ears vary in shape, and
certain strains, in England, inherit a pencil-like tuft of hairs,
above a quarter of an inch in length, on the tips of their
ears ; and this same peculiarity, according to Mr. Blyth, cha-
racterises some cats in India. The great variability in the
length of the tail and the lynx-like tufts of hairs on the ears
are apparently analogous to differences in certain wild species
of the genus. A much more important difference, according
to Daubenton,®® is that the intestines of domestic cats are
wider, and a third longer, than in wild cats of the same size ;
and this apparentl}^ has been by their less strictly carnivorouH
diet.
Qiiotea by Isid. Gecffroy, ‘ Hist. Nat . Gen., tom ni. p. 427.
Chap. IL
UORSES; THEIR VARIATION.
51
CIIAPTEE II.
HORSES AND ASSES.
HORSE. — DIFFERENCES IN THE BREEDS — INDIVIDUAL VARIABILITY OF —
DIRECrr EFFECTS OF THE CONDITIONS OF LIFE — CAN WITHSTAND MUCH COLD
— BREEDS MUCH MODIFIED BY SELECTION — COLOURS OP THE HORSE —
DAPPLING DARK STRIPES ON THE SPINE, LEGS, SHOULDERS, AND FOREHEAD
— DUN-COLOURED HORSES MOST FREQUENTLY STRIPED — STRIPES PROBABLY
DUE TO REVERSION TO THE PRIMITIVE STATE OP THE HORSE.
ASSKS. — BREEDS OF — COLOUR OP — LEG- AND SHOULDER- STRIPES — SHOULDER-
STRIPES SOMETIMES ABSENT, SOMETIMES FORKED.
The history of the Horse is lost in antiquity. Eemains of
this animal in a domesticated condition have been found in
the SvFiss lake-dwellings, belonging to the Neolithic period.^
At the present time the number of breeds is great, as may be
seen by consulting any treatise on the Horse. ^ Looking
only to the native ponies of Great Britain, those of the
Shetland Isles, Wales, the New Forest, and Devonshire are
distinguishable ; and so it is, amongst other instances, with
each separate island in the great Malay archipelago.^ Some
of the breeds present great differences in size, shape of ears,
length of mane, proportions of the body, form of the withers
and hind quarters, and especially in the head. Compare the
race-horse, dray-horse, and a Shetland pony in size, con-
figuration, and disposition ; and see how much greater the
difference is than between the seven or . eight other living
species of tlie genus Equus.
• Riitimeyer, ‘ Fauna der Pfahl-
bauten,’ 18dl, s. 122.
* See Youatt on the Horse : J.
Lawrence on the Horse, 1829; W. C.
L. Martin, ‘ History of the Horse,’
184-5; Col. H, Smith, in ‘Nat.
Library, Horses,’ 18+1, vol. xii. :
Prof. Veith, ‘ Die naturgesch. Haus-
sangethiere,’ 1856.
® Crawfurd, ‘ Descript. Diet, of
Indian Islands,’ 1856, p. 153. “There
lie many different breeds, every
island having at least one peculiar t<*
it.” Thus in Sumatra there are at
least two breeds; in Achin and Batu-
bara one ; in Jai^a several breeds ;
one in Bali, Lomboc, Sumbawa (one
of the best breeds), Tambora, Bima,
Gunung-api, Celebes, Sumba, and
Philippines. Other breeds are speci-
fied by Zollinger in the ‘ Journal of
the Indian Archipelago,’ vol. v. u. o43,
&c.
52
HORSES.
Chap. 1 1
Of iudividiial variations not known to characterise par-
ticular breeds, and not great or injurious enough to be called
monstrosities, I have not collected many cases. Mr. Gr. Brown,
of tlie Cirencester Agricultural College, who has particularly
attended to the dentition of our domestic animals, writes to
me that he has “several times noticed eight permanent
incisors instead of six in the jaw.” Male horses only
should have canines, but they are occasionally found in tiie
mare, though a small size.^ The number of ribs on each
side is properly eighteen, but Youatt^ asserts that not
unfrequently there are nineteen, the additional one being
always the posterior rib. It is a remarkable fact that the
ancient Indian horse is said in the Eig-Yeda to have only
seventeen ribs ; and M. Pietrement,® who has called attention
to this subject, gives various reasons for placing full trust in
this statement, more especially as during former times the
Hindoos carefully counted the bones of animals. I have seen
several notices of variations in the bones of the leg; thus
Mr. Price ^ speaks of an additional bone in the hock, and of
certain abnormal appearances between the tibia and astra-
galus, as quite common in Irish horses, and not due to disease.
Plorses have often been observed, according to M. Gaudry,^
to possess a trapezium and a rudiment of a fifth metacarpal
bone, so that “ one sees a];)pearing by monstrosity, in the foot
of the horse, structures which normally exist in the foot of
the Hipparion,” — an allied and extinct animal. In various
countries horn-like projections have been observed on the
frontal bones of the horse : in one case described by Mr.
Percival they arose about two inches above the orbital pro-
cesses, and were “ very like those in a calf from five to six
months old,” being from half to three-quarters of an inch in
length.® Azara has described two cases in South America in
* ‘The Horse,’ &c. by John Law-
rence, 1829, p. 14.
® ‘The Veterinary,’ London, vol. v.
p. 543.
® ‘Memoire sur les chevaux a
trente-quatre cotes,’ 1871.
^ Proc. Veterinary Assoc., in ‘The
Veterinary,’ vol. xiii. p. 42.
* ‘ Bulletin de la Soc. Geblog.,’ tom.
xxii., 1866, p. 22.
® Mr. Percival, of the Enniskillen
Dragoons, in ‘ The Veterinary,’ vol. i.
p. 224: see Azara, ‘ Des Quadruples
du Paraguay,’ tom. ii. p. 313. The
French translator of Azara refers to
other cases mentioned by Hazard as
having occurred m Spain.
Chap. II.
THEIK VAKIATION.
53
u'liicli the projections were between three and four inches in
length : other instances have occurred in Spain.
That there has been much inherited variation in the horse
cannot be doubted, when we reflect on the number . of the
breeds existing throughout the world or even within the
same country, and when we know that they have largely
increased in number since the earliest known records. Even
in so fleeting a character as colour, Hofacker found that,
out of 216 cases in which horses of the same colour were
paired, only eleven pairs produced foals of a quite different
colour. As Professor Low has remarked, the English race-
horse offers the best possible evidence of inheritance. The
pedigree of a race-horse is of more value in judging of its
probable success than its appearance ; “ King Herod ” gained
in prizes 201,50C<Z. sterling, and begot 497 winners ; ‘‘ Eclipse ’
begot 334 winners.
Whether the whole amount of difference ^ between the
various breeds has arisen under domestication is doubtful.
From the fertility of the most distinct breeds when crossed,
naturalists have generally looked at all the breeds as having
descended from a single species. Few will agree with
Colonel H. Smith, who believes that they have descended
from no less than five primitive and differently coloured
stocks. But as several species and varie’ies of the horse
existed during the later tertiary periods, and as Eutimeyer
found differences in the size and form of the skull in the
earliest known domesticated horses,^® we ought not to feel
sure that all our breeds are descended from a single species.
Godron, ‘ De I’Esp&ce,’ tom. i.
p. 378.
" ‘ Ueber die Eigenschaftcn,’ &c.,
1828, s. 10.
‘ Domesticated Animals of the
British Islands,’ pp. 527, 532. In all
the veterinary treatises and papers
which I have read, the writers insist
in the strongest terms on the inherit-
ance by the horse of all good and bad
tendencies and qualities. Perhaps the
principle of inheritance is not really
stronger in the horse than in any other
animal; but, from its value, the
tendency has been more carefully
observed
Andrew Knight crossed breeds so
different in size as a dray-horse and
Norwegian pony ; see A. Walker on
‘ Intermarriage,’ 1838, p. 205.
‘ Nat. Library, Horses,’ vol. xii.
p. 208.
Gervais, ‘Hist. Nat Mamm,,
tom. ii. p. 143. Owen, ‘ British Fossil
Mammals,’ p. 383.
‘ Kenntniss der fossilen Pferde,
1863, s. 131.
54
HOKSES.
Cjiai . U
The savages of North and South America easily reclaim the
feral horses, so that there is no improbability in ravages in
various quarters of the world having domesticated more than
one native species or natural race. M. Sanson thinks that
he has proved that two distinct species have been domesti-
cated, one in the East, and one in North Africa ; and that
these differed in the number of their lumbar vertebra and in
various other parts ; but M. Sanson seems to believe that osteo-
logical characteis are subject to very little variation, which
is certainly a mistake. At present no aboriginal or truly
wild horse is positively known to exist ; for it is commonly
believed that ihe wild Inu’ses of the East are escaped
domestic animals. If therefore our domestic breeds are
descended from several species or natural races, all have
become extinct in the wild state.
With respect to the causes of the modifications which
horses have undergone, the conditions of life seem to produce
a considerable direct effect. Mr. D. Forbes, who has had
excellent opportunities of comparing the horses of Spain
with those of South America, informs me that the horses of
Chile, which have lived under nearly the same conditions as
their progenitors in Andalusia, remain unaltered, whilst the
Pampas horses and the Puno ponies are considerably modified.
There can be no doubt that horses become greatly reduced
in size und altered in appearance by living on mountains
and islands ; and this apparently is due to want of nutritious
or varied food. Every one knows how small and rugged the
ponies are on the Northern islands and on the mountains of
Europe. Corsica and Sardinia have their native ponies ; and
there were,^® or still are, on some islands on the coast of
Virginia, ponies like those of the Shetland Islands, which
are believed to have originated through exposure to un-
favourable conditions. The Puno ponies, which inhabit the
‘ Comptes rendus,’ p. 485,
lad ‘ Journal de I’Anat. et de la Phvs.,’
Mai 1868.
Mr. W. C. L. Martin ( ‘ The
flor.se,’ 1845, p. 34), in arguing
against the belief that the wild
Kastern horses are merely feral, has
remarked on the improbability of man
in ancient times having e.xtirpated a
species in a region where it can now
exist in numbers.
‘Transact. Maryl.rnd A<',ade.my,
vol. i. part i. p. 28.
Chap. IL
THEIR VARIATION.
55
lofty regions of the Cordillera, are, as I hear from Mr. D,
Forbes, strange little creatures, very unlike their Spanish
progenitors. Further south, in the Falkland Islands, the
offspring of the horses imported in 1764 have already so
inaoh deteriorated in size^° and strength that they are un-
fitted for catching wild cattle with the lasso ; so that fresh
horses have to be brought for this purpose from La Plata at
a great expense. The reduced size of the horses bred (»n
both southern and northern islands, and on several moun-
tain-chains, can hardly have been caused by the cold, as a
similar reduction has occurred on the Virginian and Medi-
terranean islands. The horse can withstand intense cold,
for wild troops live on the plains of Siberia under lat. 56°,^^
and aboriginally the hoi'ses must have inhabited countries
annually covered with snow, for he long retains the instinct
of scraping it away to get at the herbage beneath. The
wild tarpans in the East have this instinct ; and so it U, as
I am informei by Admiral Sulivan, with the horses recently
and formerly introduced into the Falkland Islands fiom
La Plata, >-ome of which have run wild ; this latter fact is
remarkable, as the progenitors of these horses could not h (ve
followed this instinct during many generations in La Plata.
On the other hand, the wild cattle of the Falkland s never
scrape away the snow, and perish when the ground is long
covered. In the northern parts of America the horses de-
scended from those introduced by the Spanish conquerors of
Mexico, have the same habit, as have the native bisons, but
not so the cattle introduced from Europe.
The horse can flourish under intense heat as well as under
intense cold, for he is known to come to the highest perfec-
tion, though not attaining a large size, in Arabia and
northern Africa. Much humidity is apparently more in-
jurous to the horse than heat or cold. In the Falkland
Islands, horses suffer much from the dampness; and this
Mr. Mackinnon on ‘ The Falkland burgh,’ 1777, part ii. p 2H5. With
.iiands,’ p. 25. The average height of respect to the tarpans scraping away
the Falkland horses is said to be 14 the snow, fee Col. Hamilton Smith in
bands 2 inches. See also my ‘ Journal ‘ Nat. Lib vol. xii. p. 165.
of Researches.’ Franklin’s ‘ Narrative,’ vol. i. j)
Pallas, ‘Act. itcad. Si. Peters- 87 ; note by Sir J. Richardson.
HOUSES.
ClIAl'. 11.
f)(j
circumstance may perhaps partly account for the singular
fact that to the eastward of the Bay of Bengal, over aii
enormous and humid area, in Ava, Pegu, Siam, the Malayan
arcliipelago, the Loo Choo Islands, and a large part ot
China, no full-sized hors(j is found. When we advance as
far eastward as Japan, the horse reacquires his full size.^'^
\\ ith most of our domesticated animals, some breeds are
hept on account of their curiosity or beauty; but the horse
is valued almost solely for its utility. Hence semi-rnonstrous
breeds are not preserved ; and probably all the existing
breeds have been slowly formed either by the direct action
of the conditions of life, or through the selection of individual
differences. Ko doubt semi-monstrous breeds might have
been formed : thus Mr. Waterton records the case of a mare
vhich produced successively thi’ee foals without tails ; so
that a tailless race might have been formed like the tailless
races of dogs and cats. A Russian breed of horses is said to
have curled hair, and Azara relates that in Paraguay
horses are occasionally born, but are generally destroyed,
with hair like that on the head of a negro ; and this pecu-
liarity is transmitted even to half-breeds : it is a curious
case of correlation that such horses have short manes and
tails, and their hoofs are of a peculiar shape like, those of
a mule.
It is scarcely possible to doubt that the long-continued
selection of qualities serviceable to man has been the chief
agent in the formation of the several breeds of the horse.
Look at a dray-horse, and see how well ada^^ted he is to draw
heavy weights, and how unlike in appearance to any allied
wild animal. The English race-horse is knoAvn to be de-
rived from the commingled blood of Arabs, Turks, and
Barbs ; but selection, which was carried on during very early
22 Mr. J. H. Mooi’, ‘ Notices of the Service Institution,’ vol. iv.
Indian Archipelago Singapore, 1837, ‘ Essays on Natural History,’ 2n(l
p. 189. A pony from Java was sent series, p. 161.
(‘ Athenasuin,’ 1842, p. 718) to tlie ‘ Qixadru pedes du Paraguay,’
Queen only 28 inches in height. For tom. ii. p. 333. Dr. Canfield informs
the Loo Choo Islands, see Beechey’s ■ me that a breed with curly hair was
‘ Voyage,’ 4th edit., oul. i. p. 499. forrrid by selection at Los Angeles in
J. Jrawfnrd, ‘ History of the No:th America.
Horse;’ ‘Journal of Royal United
ClIAl’. II.
THEIE COLOURS AND STRIPES.
o7
times in England, together with, training, have made him a
very different animal from his parent-stocks. As a writer in
India, who evidently knows the pure Arab well, asks, who
now, “ looking at our present breed of race-horses, could have
conceived that they were the result of the union of the Arab
horse and African mare ? ” The improvement is so marked
that in running for the Goodwood Cup “ the first descendants
of Arabian, Turkish, and Persian horses, are allowed a dis-
count of 18 lbs. weight ; and when both parents are of these
countries a discount of 36 Ibs.^® It is notorious that the
Arabs have long been as careful about the pedigree of their
horses as we are, and this implies great and continued care
in breeding. Seeing what has been done in England by
careful breeding, can we doubt that the Arabs must likewise
have produced during the course of centuries a marked effect
on the qualities of their horses? But we may go much
farther back in time, for in the Bible we hear of studs care-
fully kept for breeding, and of horses imported at high prices
from various countries. We may therefore conclude that,
whether or not the various existing breeds of the horse have
proceeded from one or more aboriginal stocks, yet that a great
amount of change has resulted from the direct action of the
conditions of life, and probably a still greater amount from
the long-continued selection by man of slight individual
differences.
With several domesticated quadrupeds and birds, certain
coloured marks are either stronglj^ inherited or tend to re-
appear after having been lost for a long time. As this
subject will hereafter be seen to be of importance, 1 will give
a full account of the colouring of horses. All English breeds,
See the evidence on this head in
' Land and Water,’ May 2nd, 1868.
Prof. Low, ‘ Domesticated Ani-
mals,’ p. 546. With respect to the
writer in India, see ‘ India Sporting
Review,’ vol. ii. p. 181. As Lawrence
has remarked ( ‘ The Horse,’ p. 9),
perha]i.s no instance has ever oc-
curred of a three-part bred horse {i.e.
H hi'i'se, one of whose grandparents
was of impure blood) saving his dis-
tance in running two miles with
thoroughbred racers.” Some few in-
stances are on record of seven-eights
racers having been successful.
Prof. Gervais (in his ‘Hist. Nat.
Mamm.,’ tom. ii. p. 1 J-4) has collected
many facts on this head. For instance,
Solomon (Kings, B. i. ch. x. v. 28)
bought horses in Egypt at a high
price.
58
HORSES.
Chap. II
however unlike in size and appearance, and several of those
in India and the Malay archipelago, present a similar range
and diversity of colour. The English race-horse, however,
is said never to he dun-coloured ; hut as dun and cream-
coloured horses are considered hy the Arabs as worthless,
“and fit only for Jews to ride,” these tints may have heen
removed hy long-continued selection. Horses of every colour,
and of such widely different kinds as draj-horses, cohs, and
ponies, are all occasionally dappled,^^ in the same manner as
is so conspicuous with grey horses. This fact does not throw
any clear light on the colouring of the aboriginal horse, hut
is a case of analogous variation, for even asses are sometimes
dappled, and I have seen, in the British Museum, a hybrid
from the ass and zebra dappled on its hinder quaiters. By
the expression analogous variation (and it is one that I
shall often have occasion to use) I mean a variation occurring
in a species or variety which resembles a normal character in
another and distinct species or variety. Analogous variations
may arise, as will be explained in a future chapter, from two
or more forms with a similar constitution having been ex-
posed to similar conditions, — or from one of two forms having
reacquired through reversion a character inherited by the
other form from their common progenitor, — or from both
forms having reverted to the same ancestral character. We
shall immediately see that horses occasionally exhibit a ten-
dency to become striped over a large part of their bodies ;
and as we know that in the varieties of the domestic cat and
in several feline species stripes readily pass into spots and
cloudy marks — even the cubs of the uniformly-coloured lion
being spotted with dark marks on a lighter ground — wo
may suspect that the dappling of the horse, which has been
‘The Field,’ July 13th, 1861, p.
12.
E. Vevnon Harcourt, ‘Sporting
ill Algeria,’ p. 26.
I state this from mv o\vu obser-
vations made during several years ou
tluf colours of horses. I have seen
eream-coloui'ed, light-dun and mouse-
diiu hoiscs dappled, whicli I ineution
because it has been stated (Martiii,
‘History of the Horse,’ p. 134) tiiat
duns are never dapjded. Martin (p.
20j) refers to tlajijiled asses. In the
Farrier ’ (l.oudon, 1828, pp. 453, 455)
there are some goo I remarks on thr
dappling of horses; and likewise ijj
Col. Hamiltou Smith on ‘ the Hor.so
Chap. 11.
THEIE, COLOURS AND STRIPES.
59
noticed by some authors with surprise, is a modification or
vestige of a tendency to become striped.
This tendency in the horse to become striped is in several respects
an interesting fact. Horses of all colours, of the most diverse breeds,
)n various parts of the world, often have a dark stripe extending
along the spine, from the mane to the tail ; but this is so common
that I need enter into no particulars.^^ Occasionally horses are
traijsversely barred on the legs, cliiefly on the under 'side; andrhore
rarely they have a distinct stripe on the shoulder, like that on the
shoulder of the ass, or a broad dark patch representing a stripe.
Before entering on any details I must premise that the term dun-
coloured is vague, and includes three groups of colours, viz., that
Pig- 1- — Dun Devonshire Pony, with shoulder, spinal, and leg stripes.
between cream-colour and reddish-brown, which graduates into
light-bay or light-chestnut — this, I believe is often called fallow-
dun ; secondly, leaden or slate-colour or mouse-dun, which graduates
into an ash-colour; and, lastly, dark-dun, between brown and black.
In England I have examined a rather large, lightly-built, fallow-
dun Devonshire pony (fig. 1), with a conspicuous stripe along the
back, with light transverse stripes on the under sides of its front
legs, and with four parallel stripes on each shoulder. Of these four
stripes the posterior one was very minute and faint; the anterior
one, on the other hand, was long and broad, but interrupted in Ine
Some details are given in ‘The
Farrier,’ 1828, pp. 452, 455. One of
the smallest ponie? I ever saw, of the
colour of a mouse, had a conspicuous
spinal stripe, A small Indian chest-
nut pony had the same stripe, as had
a remarkably heavy chestnut cart-
horse. Race-horses often have the
spinal stripe.
HORSES.
Ohai>. II
BO
middle, and truncated at its lower extremity, with tlie anteriof
angle produced into a long tapering point, 1 mention this latter
fact liecause the shoulder- stripe of the ass occasionally presents
exactly the same appearance. I have had an outline and description
gent to me of a small, purely-bred, light fallow-dun Welch pony,
with a spinal stripe, a single transverse stripe on each leg, and three
shoulder-stripes; the posterior stripe corresponding with that on
the shoulder of the ass was the longest, whilst the two anterior
parallel stripes, arising from the mane, decreased in length, in a
reversed manner as compared with the shoulder -stripes on the
above-described Devonshire pony. I have seen a bright fallow-dun
cob, with its front legs transversely barred on the under sides in the
most conspicuous manner; also a dark-leadm mouse -coloured pony
with similar leg stripes, but much less conspicuous ; also a bright
fallow- dun colt, fully three-parts thoroughbred, with very plain
transvere stripes on the legs ; also a chestnut-dun cart-horse with
a conspicuous spinal stripe, with distinct traces of shoulder-stripes,
but none on the legs; I could add other cases. My son made a
sketch for me of a large, heavy, Belgian cart-horse, of a fallow-dun,
with a conspicuous spinal stripe, traces of leg-stripes, and with two
parallel (three inches apart) stripes about seven or eight inches in
length on both shoulders. I have seen another rather light cart-
horse, of a dirty dark cream-colour, with striped legs, and on one
shoulder a large ill-defined dark cloudy patch, and on the opposite
shoulder two parallel faint stripes. All the cases yet mentioned are
duns of various tints; but Mr. W. W, Edwards has seen a nearly
thoroughbred chestnut horse which had the spinal strifie. and
distinct bars on the legs; and I have seen two bay carriage-horses
with black spinal stripes; one of these horses had on each shouldei'
a light shoulder-stripe, and the other had a broad back ill-defined
stripe, running obliquely half-way down each shoulder ; neither had
leg-stripes.
The most interesting case which I have met with occurred in a
colt of my own breeding. A bay mare (descended from a dark-
brown Flemish mare by a light grey Turcoman horse) was put to
Hercules, a thoroughbred dark bay, whose sire (Kingston) and dam
were both bays. The colt ultimately turned out brown ; but when
only a fortnight old it was a dirty bay, shaded with mouse-grey,
•and in parts with a yellowish tint : it had only a trace of the spinal
stripe, with a few obscure transverse bars on the legs ; but almost
the whole body was marked with verv narrow dark stripes, in most
parts so obscure as to be visible only in certain lights, like the
stripes which may be seen on black kittens. These stripes were
distinct on the hind-quarters, where they diverged from the spine,
and pointed a litile forwards; many of them as they diverged
became a little branched, exactly in the same manner as in some
?:(3brine species. The stripes were plainest on the forehead between
the ears, where they formed a set of pointed arches, one under
the other, decreasing in size downwards towards the muzzle;
exactly similar marks ma.y bo seen on the forehead of the quagga
Chap. II.
THEIR COLOURS AND STRIPES.
61
and BurcheH’s zebra. When this foal was two or three months old
all the stripes entirely disappeared. I have seen similar marks on
the forehead of a fully grown, fallow-dun, cob-like horse, having
a conspicuous spinal stripe, and with its front legs well barred.
In Norway the colour of the native horse or pony is dnn, varying
from almost cream-colour to dark-mouse dun; and an animal is not
considered purely bred unless it has the spinal and leg-stripes.^^
My son estimated that about a third of the ponies which he saw
there had striped legs; he counted seven stripes on the fore-legs and
cwo on the hind-legs of one pony ; only a few of them exhibited
traces of shoulder stripes ; but I have heard of a cob imported from
Norway which had the shoulder as well as the other stripes well
developed. Colonel H. Smith alludes to dun-horses with the
spinal stripe in the Sierras of Spain; and the horses originally
derived from Spain, in some parts of South America, are now duns.
Sir W. Elliot informs me that he inspected a herd of 300 South
American horses imported into Madras, and many of these had
transverse stripes on the legs and short shoulder-stripes; the most
strongly marked individual, of which a coloured drawing was sent
me, was a mouse-dun, with the shoulder- stripes slightly forked.
In the North-Western parts of India striped horses of more than
one breed are apparently commoner than in any other part of the
world; and I have received information respecting them from
several officers, especially from Colonel Poole, Colonel Curtis, Major
Campbell, Brigadier St. John, and others. The Kattywar horses
are often fifteen or sixteen hands in height, and are well but lightly
built. They are of all colours, but the several kinds of duns prevail ;
and these are so generally striped, that a horse without stripes is
not considered pure. Colonel Poole believes that all the duns have
the spinal stripe, the leg-stripes are generally present, and he thinks
that about half the horses have the shoulder-stripe ; this stripe is
sometimes double or treble on both shoulders. Colonel Poole has
often seen stripes on the cheeks and sides of the nose. He has seen
stripes on the grey and bay Kattywars when first foaled, but they
soon faded away. I have received other accounts of cream-coloured,
bay, brown, and grey Kattywar horses being striped. Eastward of
India, the Shan (north of Burmah) ponies, as I am informed by
Mr. Blyth, have spinal, leg, and shoulder stripes. Sir W. Elliot
informs me that he saw two bay Pegu ponies with leg-stripes.
Burmese and Javanese ponies are frequently dun-coloured, and have
the three kinds of stripes, “in the same degree as in England.”^®
Mr. Swinhoe informs me that he examined two light-dun ponies ol
I have received information,
through the kindness of the Consul-
General, Mr. J. R. Crowe, from Prof.
Boeck, Rasck, and Esmarck, on the
colours of the Norwegian ponies. See
also ‘The Field,’ 1861, p. 431
Col. Hamilton Smith, ‘ Nat. Lib.
vol. xii. p. 275.
Mr. G. Clark, in ‘ Annal and l^Iag.
of Nat. History,’ 2nd series, vol. ii
1848, p. 363. Mr. Wallace informs
me that he saw in Java a dun and
clay-coloured horse with spinal and
leg strij[>es.
HORSES.
Ciiii-. IL
02
two Chinese breeds, viz. those of Shanghai and Amoy ; both had the
spinal stripe, and the latter an indistinct shoulder-stripe.
We thus see that in all parts of the world breeds of the horse as
different as possible, when of a dun-colour (iacluding under this
term a wide range of tint from cream to dusty black), and rarely
when almost white tinged with yellow, grey, bay. and chestnut, have
the several above-specified stripes. Horses which are of a yellow
colour with white mane and tail, and which are sometimes called
duns, I have never seen with stripes.^^
From reasons which will be apjDarent in the chapter on Eeversion,
I have endeavoured, but with poor success, to discover whether
duns, which are so much oftener striped than other coloured horses,
are ever produced from the crossing of two horses, neither of which
are duns. Most persons to whom I have applied believe that one
parent must be dun; and it is generally asserted, that, when this is
the case, the dun-colour and the stripes are strongly inherited.^*
One case, however, has fallen under my own observation of a
foal from a black mare by a bay horse, which when fully grown
was a da]’k fallow-dun and had a narrow but plain spinal
stripe. Hofacker gives two instances of mouse-duns (Mausrap]))
being produced from two parents of different colours and neither
duns.
The stripes of all kinds are generally plainer in the foal than in
the adult horse, being commonly lost at the firs+ stiedding of the
hair.^^ Colonel Poole believes that “the stripes in the Kattywar
breed are plainest when the colt is first foaled ; they then become
less and less distinct till after the first coat is shed, when they come
out as strongly as before ; but certainly often fade away as the age
of the horse increases.” Two other accounts confirm this fading of
the stripes in old horses in India. One writer, on the other hand,
states that colts are often born without stripes, but that they appear
as the colt grows older. Three authorities affirm that in Norway
the stripes are less plain in the foal than in the adult. In the case
described by me of the young foal which Avas narroAvly striped over
nearly all Its body, there was no doubt about the early and complete
disappearance of the stripes. Mr. W. W. Echvards examined for
me twenty-two foals of race-horses, and twelve had the spinal stripe
more or less plain; this fact, and some other accounts which I have
received, lead me to believe that the spinal stripe often disappears in
the English race-horse when old. With natural species, the young
often exhibit characters which disappear at maturity.
The stripes are variable in colour, but are always darker
than the rest of the body. They do not by any means always
See, also, on this point, * The ‘ Uebev die Eigenschaften,’ &c.,
Field,’ July 27th, 1861, p. 91. 1828, s. 13, 14.
** ‘Tlie Field,’ 1861, pp. 431, 493 ‘‘® Von Nathusius, ‘Vortrage iib<*i
&45. Viehzucht,’ 1872, 135
Chai>. 11.
THEIR COLOURS AND STRIPES.
63
coexist on the different parts of the body : the legs may he
striped without any shoulder-stripe, or the converse case,
which is rarer, may occur ; but I have never heard of either
shoulder or leg-stripes without the spinal stripe. The lat ter is
by far the commonest of all the stripes, as might have been
expected, as it characterises the other seven or eight species
of the genus. It is remarkable that so trifling a character as
the shoulder-stripe being double or triple should occur in
such different breeds as Welch and Devonshire ponies, the
Shan pony, heavy cart-horses, light South American horses,
and the lanky Kattywar breed. Colonel Hamilton Smith
believes that one of his five supposed primitive stocks was
dun- coloured and striped ; and that the stripes in all the
other breeds result from ancient crosses with this one primi-
tive dun; but it is extremely improbable that different
breeds living in such distant quarters of the world should all
have been crossed with any one aboriginally distinct stock.
Nor have we any reason to believe that the effects of a cross
at a very remote period would be propagated for so many
generations as is implied on this view.
With respect to the primitive colour of the horse having
been dun, Colonel Hamilton Smith has collected a large
body of evidence showing that this tint was common in the
East as far back as the time of Alexander, and that the wild
horses of Western Asia and Eastern Europe now are, or re-
cently were, of various shades of dun. It seems that not very
long ago a wild breed of dun-coloured horses with a spinal
stripe was preserved in the royal parks in Prussia. I hear
from Hungary that the inhabitants of that country look at
the duns with a spinal stripe as the aboriginal stock, and so
it is in Norway. Dun-coloured ponies are not rare in the
mountainous parts of Devonshire, Wales, and Scotland, where
the aboriginal breed would have the best chance of being
“ ‘Nat. Library,’ vol. xii. (1841),
p[). 109, 156 to 163, *280, 281.-
Cream-colour, passing into Isabella
(i.e. the colour of the dirty linen of
Queen Isabella), seems to have been
stimmon in ancient times. See also
Pallas *3 account of the wild horses of
the East, who speaks of dun and brown
as the prevalent colours. In the
Icelandic sagas, which were committed
to writing in the twelfth century,
dun-coloured horses with a black
spinal stripe are mentioned; see
Dasent’s translation, vol. i. p. 169
6i
HORSES.
Chap. II
preserved. In South America in the time of Azara, when
the horse had been feral for about 250 years, 90 out of a 100
horses were “ bai-chatains,” and the remaining ten were
“ zains,” that is brown ; not more than one in 2000 being
black. In North America the feral horses show a strong
tendency to become roans of various shades ; but in certai u
parts, as I hear from Dr. Canfield, they are mostly duns an
striped.
In the following chapters on the Pigeon we shall see tliat a
blue bird is occasionally produced by pure breeds of various
colours and that when this occurs certain black marks in-
variably appear on the wings and tail ; so again, when vari-
ously coloured breeds are crossed, blue birds with the same
black marks are frequently produced. We shall further see
that these facts are explained by, and afford strong evidence
in favour of, the view that all the breeds are descended
from the rock-pigeon, or Columha livia, which is thus coloured
and marked. But the appearance of the stri23es on the
various breeds of the horse, when of a dun colour, does not
afford nearly such good evidence of their descent from a
single primitive stock as in the case of the joigeon : because
no horse certainly wild is known as a standard of comparison ;
because the stripes when they ap2)ear are variable in cha-
racter ; because there is far from sufficient evidence that the
crossing of distinct breeds produces stripes, and lastly,
because all the species of the genus Equus ha\ e the spinal
stripe, and several species have shoulder and leg stripes.
Nevertheless the similarity in the most distinct breeds in
their general range of colour, in their dappling, and in the
occasional appearance, especially in duns, of leg-stripes and
of double or triple shoulder strijoes, taken together, indicate
Azara, ‘ Quadnipedos du Para-
guay,’ tom. ii. p. 307. In North
America, Gatlin (vol. ii. p. 57) de-
scribes the wild horsesj believed to
have descended from the Spanish
horses of Me.xico, as of all colours,
black, grey, roan, and roan pied with
sorrel. F. Michaux ( ‘ Travels in
North America,’ Eng. translat., p. 235)
describes two wild horses from Mexico
as roau. In the Falkland Islands,
where the horse has been feral only
between 60 and 70 years, I was told
that roans and iron-greys were the
prevalent colours. These several facts
show that horses do not soon revert
to any uniform colour.
Chat IL ASSES : THEIll COLOURS AND STRIPES.
65
the probability of the descent of all the existing races from a
single, dun-coloured, more or less striped, primitive stock, to
which our horses occasionally revert.
The Ass.
Four species of Asses, besides three zebras, have been de-
scribed by naturalists. There is now little doubt that our
domesticated animal is descended from the Equus tceniojpus of
Abyssinia.^^ The ass is sometimes advanced as an instance
of an animal domesticated, as we know by the Old Testament,
from an ancient period, which has varied only in a very slight
degree. But this is by no means strictly true; for in Syria
alone there are four breeds first, a light and graceful
animal, with an agreeable gait, used by ladies ; secondly,
an Arab breed reserved exclusively for the saddle; thirdly,
a stouter animal used for ploughing and various purposes ;
and lastly, the large Damascus breed, with a peculiarly long
body and ears. In the South of France also there are several
breeds, and one of extraordinary size, some individuals being
as tall as full-sized horses. Although the ass in England is
by no means uniform in appearance, distinct breeds have not
been formed. This may probably be accounted for by the
animal being kept chiefly by poor j)ersons, who do not rear
large numbers, nor carefully match and select the young.
For, as we shall see in a future chapter, the ass can with
ease be greatly improved in size and strength by careful
selection, combined no doubt with good food ; and we may
infer that all its other characters would be equally amend-
able to selection. The small size of the ass in England and
Northern Europe is apparently due far ‘more to want of care
in breeding than to cold ; for in Western India, where the ass
is used as a beast of burden by some of the lower castes, it is
not much larger than a Newfoundland dog, “being generally
not more than from twenty to thirty inches high.”
43 Dr. Sclater, ‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’
1862, p. 164. Dr. Hartmann says
(‘Annalen der Landw.,’ B. xliv. p.
222) that this animal in its wild state
is not always striped across the
legs.
® G
44 W. C. Martin, ‘History of the
Horse,’ 1845, p. 207.
45 Col. Sykes’ Cat. of Mammalia,
‘Proc. Zooiog. Soc.,’ July 12th, 1831.
Williamson, ‘Oriental Field Sports,’
vol. ii., quoted by Martin, p. 206.
(>()
ASSES :
CllAl'. 11
The ass varies greatly in colour ; and its legs, especially
the fore-legs, both in England and other countries — for
instance, in China — are occasionally barred more plainly
than those of dun-coloured horses. Thirteen or fourteen
transverse stripes have been counted on both the fore and
bind legs. With the horse the occasional ajopearance of leg-
stripes was accounted for by reversion to a supposed parent-
form, and in the case of the ass we may confidently believe in
this explanation, as E. tceniopus is known to be barred, though
only in a slight degree, and not quite invariably. The stripes
are believed to occur most frequently and to be plainest on
the legs of the domestic ass during early youth, as likewise
occurs with the horse. The shoulder-stripe, which is so emi
nently characteristic of the species, is nevertheless variable
in breadth, length, and manner of termination. I have
measured one four times as broad as another, and some more
than twice as long as others. In one light-grey ass the
shoulder-stripe was only six inches in length, and as thin as
a piece of string ; and in another animal of the same colour
there was only a dusky shade representing a stripe. I have
heard of three white asses, not albinoes, with no trace of
shoulder or spinal stripes and I have seen nine other asses
with no shoulder stripe, and some of them had no spinal
stripe. Three of the nine were light-grej^s, one a dark-grey,
another giey passing into reddish-roan, and the others were
brown, two being tinted on parts of their bodies with a
reddish or bay shade. If therefore grey and reddish-brown
asses had been steadily selected and bred from, the shoulder
stripe would probably have been lost almost as generally and
completely as in the case of the horse.
The shoulder stripe on the ass is sometimes double, and
]\Ir. Blyth has seen even three or four parallel stripes.^^ ]
have observed in ten cases shoulder-sfripes abruptly trun
cated at the lower end, with the anterior angle produced into
a tapering point, precisely as in the above dun Devonshire
Blyth, in ‘ Charlesworth’s Mag. ‘ The Horse,’ p. 205.
of Nat. Hist.,’ vol iv., 18-10, p. 88. I ‘ Journal As Soc. of Bengal.’ vol
have also been assured by a breeder xxviii. 1860, p. 231. Martin on tin?
that this is the case. Horse, p. 205
Oue case is gi\-on l.y Marlin.
Chai’. II.
TIJEIE COLOURS AND STRIPES.
67
pony. 1 have seen three cases of the terminal portion
abruptl}^ and angularly bent ; and have seen and heard of
four cases of a distinct though slight forking of the stripe.
In Syria, Dr. Hooker and his party observed for me no less
than five similar instances of the shoulder-stripe plainly*
bifurcating over the fore leg. In the common mule it like-
wise sometimes bifurcates. When I first noticed the forking
and angular bending of the shoulder-stripe, I had seen enough
of the stripes in the various equine species to feel convinced
that even a character so unimportant as this had a distinct
meaning, and was thus led to attend to the subject. I now
find that in the E. hurcliellU and quagga, the stripe which
corresponds with the shoulder-stripe of the ass, as well as
some of the stripes on the neck, bifurcate, and that some of
those near the shoulder have their extremities bent angularl}^
backwards. The bifurcation and angular bending of the
stripes on the shoulders apparently are connected v/ith the
nearly upright stripes on the sides of the body and neck
changing their direction and becoming transverse on the legs.
Finally, we see that the presence of shoulder, leg, and spinal
stripes in the horse, — their occasional absence in the ass, —
the occurrence of double and triple shoulder-stripes in both
animals, and the similar manner in which these stripes ter-
minate downwards,— are all cases of analogous variation in
the horse and ass. These cases are probably not due to
similar conditions acting on similar constitutions, but to a
partial reversion in colour to the common progenitor of the
genus. We shall hereafter return to this subject, and discuss
it more fully.
68
DOMESTIC PIGS.
Chap. Ill
CHAPTER III.
PIGS — CATTLE — SHEEP — GOATS.
PKJS BELONG TO TWO DISTINCT TYPES, SUS SOROFA AND INDICES- -TORF'
SCHWEIN — ^JAPAN PIGS — FERTILITY OF CROSSED PIGS — CHANGES IN TUB
SKULL OF THE HIGHLY CULTIVATED RACES — CONVERGENCE OF CHARACTEP.
— GESTATION— SOLID-HOOFED SWINE — CURIOUS APPENDAGES TO THE JAWS
— DECREASE IN SIZE OP THE TUSKS — YOUNG PIGS LONGITUDINALLY STRIPED
— FERAL PIGS — CROSSED BREEDS.
C.\TTLB. — ZEBU A DISTINCT SPECIES — EUROPEAN CATTLE PROBABLY DE-
SCENDED FROM THREE WILD FORMS — ALL THE RACES NOW FERTILE TOGETHER
— BRITISH PARK CATTLE — ON THE COLOUR OP THE ABORIGINAL SPECIES —
CONSTITUTIONAL DIFFERENCES — SOUTH AFRICAN RACES — SOUTH AMERICAN
RACES — NIATA CATTLE — ORIGIN OF THE VARIOUS RACES OF CATTLE.
SHEEP. — REMARKABLE RACES OP — VARIATIONS ATTACHED TO THE MALE SEX
— ADAPTATIONS TO VARIOUS CONDITIONS — GESTATION OF — CHANGES IN THE
WOOL — SEMI-MONSTROUS BREEDS.
GOATS. — REMARKABLE VARIATIONS OF.
The breeds of the pig have recently been more closely studied,
thougli much still remains to be done, than those of almost any
other domesticated animal. This has been effected by Her-
mann von Nathnsius in two admirable works, especially in the
later one on the Skulls of the several races, and by Eiitimeyer
in his celebrated Pauna of the ancient Swiss lake-dwellings.^
Nathusius has shown that all the known breeds may be
divided into two great groups : one resembling in all im-
portant respects and no doubt descended from the common
wild boar ; so that this may be called the Sus scrofa group,
dhie Other group differs in several important and constant
nsteological characters; its wild parent-form is unknown;
the name given to it by ^^athusius, according to the law of
priority, is Siis indicus, of Pallas. This name must now be
followed, though an unfortunate one, as the wild aboriginal
* Hermann von Nathusms, ‘Die ‘Schweineschadel,’ Berlin, 1864. Riiti-
Racen des Schweines,’ Berlin, 1860 ; meyer, ‘ Die Fauna der ' Pfahlbauteu,
ami ‘ Vorstudien fiir Geschichte,’ &c., Basel, 1801.
Chap. III.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
69
does not inhabit India, and the best -known domesticated
breeds have been imported from Siam and China.
First for the Sus scrofa breeds, or those resembling the
common wild boar. These still exist, according to Nathusia^
(Schweineschadel, s. 75), in various parts of central and
northern Europe ; formerly every kingdom,^ and almost
every province in Britain, possessed its own native breed ;
but these are now eveiywhere rapidly disappearing, being
replaced by improved breeds crossed with the S. indicus
form. The skull in the breeds of the S. scrofa type re-
sembles, in all important respects, that of the European wild
boar ; but it has become (Schweineschadel, s. 63-68) higher
and broader relatively to its length ; and the hinder part is
more upright. The differences, however, are all variable in
degree. The breeds which thus resemble S. scrofa in their
essential skulTcharacters differ conspicuously from each other
in other respects, as in the length of the ears and legs, cur-
vature of the ribs, colour, hairiness, size and proportions of
the body.
The wild Sus scrofa has a wide range, namely, Europe,
Korth Africa, as identified by osteological characters by Eiiti-
meyer, and Hindostan, as similiarly identified by Nathusius.
But the wild boars inhabiting these several countries differ
so much from each other in external characters, that they have
been ranked by some naturalists as specifically distinct. Even
within Hindostan these animals, according to Mr. Blyth,
form very distinct races in the different districts ; in the N.
Western provinces, as I am informed by the Eev. E. Everest,
the boar never exceeds 36 inches in height, whilst in Bengal
one has l^een measured 44 inches in height. In Europe,
Korthern Africa, and Hindostan, domestic pigs have been
known tc cross with the wild native species;^ and in
* Nathusius, ‘Die Racen des
Schweiues,’ Berlin, 1860. An excel-
lent appendix is given with references-
to published and trustworthy draw-
ings of the breeds of each country.
® For Europe, see Bechstein, ‘Na-
turgesch. Deutschlands,’ 1801, B. i., s.
505. Several accounts have been
published on the fertility of the off-
spring from wild and tame swine.
see Burdach’s ‘ Physiology,’ and Godron
‘ De I’Espece,’ tom. i. p. 370. For
Africa, ‘ Bull, de la Soc. d’Acclimat.,’
tom. iv. p. 389. For India, see Nathu-
sius, ‘ Schweineschadel,’ s. 148.
70
DOMESTIC PIGS.
Cjiai-. Ml
Hindostan an accurate observer,^ Sir Walter Elliot, after
describing the differences between wild Indian and wild
tlerman boars, remarks that “the same differences are per-
ceptible in the domesticated individuals of the two countries,”
We may tlierefore conclude that the breeds of the Sus scrofa
type are descended from, or have been modified by crossing
with, forms which may be ranked as geographical races, but
which, according to some naturalists, ought to be ranked as
distinct species.
Pigs of the S/^s indirus type are best known to Englishmen
under the form of the Chinese breed. The skull of S. indicus,
as described by Nathusius, differs from that of S. scrofa in
several minor respects, as in its greater breadth and in some
details in the teeth ; but chiefly in the shortness of the lachry-
mal bones, in the greater width of the fore part of the palate-
bones, and in the divergence of the j)i’emolar teeth. It
deserves especial notice that these latter characters are not
gained, even in the least degree, b}^ the domesticated forms
of S. scrofa. After reading the remarks and descriptions
given by Xathusius, it seems to me to be merely playing
Avith words to doubt whether S. indicus ought to be ranked
as a species ; for the above-specified differences are more
strongly marked than any that can be pointed out between,
for instance, the fox and the Avolf, or the ass and the horse.
As already stated, S. indicus is not known in a wild state ;
but its domesticated forms, according to Kathusius, come
near to S. vittatus of Java and some allied species. A pig-
found wild in the Am islands (ScliAveineschadel, s. 169) is
apparently identical with S. indicus: but it is doubtful
whether this is a truly native animal. The douiesticated
breeds of China, Cochin-China, and Siam belong to this type.
The Roman or Neapolitan breed, the Andalusian, the Hun
garian, and the “Krause” SAvine of hathusius, inhabiting
south-eastern Europe and Turkey, and having fine curly hair,
and the small SavIss “ BiindtiierschAAmin ” of Riitimeyer, all
agree in their more important skull-characters Avith S. indieux.
and, as is supposed, have all been largely crossed Aviih this
* Sir W. Eliiot, Catalogue of Mammalia. ‘ Madras Jourual of Lit. and Scumec,’
vol. .s. p. 219.
Chap. III.
THEIE VARIATION.
7]
form. Pigs of this type have existed during a long period
on the shores of the Mediterranean, for a figure (Schweine-
schadel, s. 142) closely resembling the existing Keaj)olitan pig
was found in the buried city of Herculaneum.
Eiitimeyer has made the remarkable discovery that there
lived contemporaneously in Switzerland, during the Neo-
lithic period, two domesticated forms, the S. s£rofa, an^tho
S. scrofa palustris or Porfschwein. Eiitimeyer perceived that
the latter approached the Eastern breeds, and, according to
Nathusius, it certainly belongs to the S. indiciis group; bat
Eiitimeyer has subsequently shown that it differs in some
well-marked characters. I'his author was formerly convinced
that his Torfschwein existed as a wild animal during the
first part of the Stone period, and was domesticated during
a later part of the same period.^ Nathusius, whilst he fully
admits the curious fact first observed by Eiitimeyer, that the
bones of domesticated and wild animals can be distinguished
by their different aspect, yet, from special difficulties in the
case of the bones of the pig (Schweineschiidel, s. 147), is not
convinced of the truth of the above conclusion ; and Eiitimeyer
himself seems now to feel some doubt. Other naturalists
have also argued strongly on the same side as Nathusius.^
Several breeds, differing in the proportions of the body, in
the length of the ears, in the nature of the hair, in colour, ikc.,
come under the S indicus type. Nor is this surprising, con-
sidering how ancient the domestication of this form has been
both in Europe and in China. In this latter country the
date is believed by an eminent Chinese scholar to go back
at least 4fi 00 years from the present time. This same scholar
alludes to the existence of many local varieties of the pig in
China ; and at the present time the Chinese take extraordi-
nary pains in feeding and tending their pigs, not even
allowing them to walk from place to place. * Hence these
j'igs, as Nathusius has remarked,^ display in an eminent degree
* ‘ Ffahlhauten,’ s. 163, et passim.- ^ Stan. Julien, quoted by de Blain-
® W.Schiitz’ interesting essay, • ville, ‘ Osteograjihie,’ p. 163,
Zur Kenntniss des Torfschweins,’ ® Richardson, • Rigs, their Origin,'
1868. This author believes that the &c., p. 26.
Torfschwein is descended from a ® ‘ Die Racen des Schweines,’ s. 47,
distinct species, the S. senncmensis of 64
Central Africa.
72
DOMESTIC PIGS.
Chap, III
the characters of a highly - cultivated race, and hence, no
doubt, their high value in the improvement of our European
breeds. Nathusius makes a remarkable statement (Schweine-
schadel, s. 138), that the infusion of the ^Vnd, or even of the
, , ^^th, part of the blood of S. indicus into a breed of S. scrofa,
is sufficient plainly to modify the skull of the latter species.
This singular fact may perhaps be accounted for by several
of the chief distinctive characters of 8. indicus, such as the
shortness of the lachrymal bones, &c., being common to
several species of the genus ; for in crosses characters which
are common to many species apparently tend to be prepotent
over those appertaining to only a few species.
The Japan pig {8. pliciceps of Gray), which was formerly
exhibited in the Zoological Gardens, has an extraordinary
appearance from its short head, broad forehead and nose,
great fleshy ears, and deeply furrowed skin. The following
woodcut is copied from that given by Mr. Bartlett.^® Kot
only is the face furrowed, but thick folds of skin, which are
harder than the other parts, almost like the plates on the
Indian rhinoceros, hang about the shoulders and rump. It
is coloured black, with white feet, and breeds true. That it
has long been domesticated there can be little doubt ; and
this might have been inferred even from the fact that its
young are not longitudinally striped ; for this is a character
common to all the species included within the genus 8us and
tlie allied genera whilst in their natural state. Dr. Gray
has described the skull of this animal, which he ranks not
only as a distinct species, but places it in a distinct section
of the genus. Nathusius, however, after his careful study of
the whole group, states positively ( Schweineschadel, s. 153-
*158) that the skull in all essential characters closely resembles
that of the short-eared Chinese breed of the 8. indicus type.
Hence Nathusius considers the Japan pig as only a domesti-
cated variety of 8. indicus : if this realh^' be the case, it is a
‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ 1861, p. 263.
“ Sclater, in ‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’
Keb. 26th, 1861.
‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ 1862, p. 13.
The skull has since been desci'ibed
much more fully by Professor Lucae
in a very interesting essay, ‘ Der
Schadel des Maskenschweine.s.’ 1870.
He confirms the conclusion of veil
Nathusius on the relationship of this
kind of pig.
THETK VAEIATION.
Chap. III.
73
wonderful instance of tlie amount of modification wMcli can
be eftected under domestication.
Formerly there existed in the central islands of the Pacific
Ocean a singular breed of pigs. These are described by the
Rev. D. Tyerman and Gr. Bennett as of small size, hump-
backed, with a disproportionately long head, with short ears
Fig. 2.— Head of Japan or Masked Pig. (Copied from Mr. Bartlett's paper in ‘ Proc. Zoolog.
Soc.’ 1861, p. 263.)
turned backwards, with a bushy tail not more than two inches
in length, placed as if it grew from the back. \\ ithin half a
century after the introduction of European, and Chinese pigs
into these islands, the native breed, according to the above
authors, became almost completely lost by being repeatedly
crossed with them. Secluded islands, as might have been
‘ Journal of Voyages and Travels from 1821 to 1829,’ vol. i. p. 300.
74
DOMESTIC PIGS.
CiiAr. Ill,
expected, seem favourable for tlie production or retention of
peculiar breeds ; thus, in the Orkney Islands, the hogs have
been described as very small, with erect and sharp ears, and
“ with an appearance altogether different from tlie hogs
brought from the south.”
Seeing how different the Chinese pigs, ibelonging to tJie
Sas indicus type, are in their osteological characters and in
external appearance from the pigs of the S. scrofa type, so
that they must be considered specifically distinct, it is a fact
well deserving attention, that Chinese and common pigs
have been repeatedly crossed in various manners, with un-
impaired fertility. One great breeder who had used pure
Chinese pigs assured me that the fertility of the half-breeds
inter se and of their recrossed progeny was actually increased ;
and this is the general belief of agriculturists. Again, the
Japan pig or S. ])Uciceps of Gray is so distinct in appearance
from all common pigs, that it stretches one’s belief to the
utmost to admit that it is simply a domestic variet}’’ ; yet
this breed has been found perfectly fertile with the Berkshire
breed ; and Mr. Eyton informs me that he paired a half-bred
brother and sister and found them quite fertile together.
The modification of the skull in the most highly cultivated
races is wonderful. To appreciate the amount of change,
Nathusius’ work, with its excellent figures, should be studied.
The whole of the exterior in all its parts has been altered :
the hinder surface, instead of sloping backwards, is directed
forwards, entailing many changes in other parts ; the front
of the head is deeply concave : the orbits have a different
shape; the auditory meatus has a different direction and
shape ; the incisors of the upper and lower jaws do not touch
each other, and they stand in both jaws beyond the plane of
the molars . the canines of the upper jaw stand in front of
those of the lower jaw, and this is a remarkable anomaly :
the articular surfaces of the occij)ital condyles are so greatly
changed in shape, that, as Nathusius remarks (s. 133), no
naturalist, seeing this important part of the skull by itself,
would suppose that it belonged to the genus Sus. I'hese
14 Kev. G. Low, ‘Fauna Oreadensis,’ p. 10. See also Dr. Hibbert’s account
of the pig of the Shetland islands.
CuAP. HI.
THEIR VARIATION.
75
and various other modifications, as Nathusius observes, can
hardly be considered as monstrosities, for they are not in-
jurious, and are strictly inherited. The whole head is much
shortened ; thus, whilst in common breeds its length to that
of the body is as 1 to 6,
in the “ cultur-racen ”
the proportion is as 1
to 9, and even recently
as 1 to 11.^^ The fol-
lowing woodcut^® of the
head of a wild boar and
of a sow from a photo-
graph of the Yorkshire
Large Breed, may aid
in showing how greatly
the head in a highly
cultivated race has been
modified and shortened.
Nathusius has well
discussed the causes of
the remarkable changes
in the skull and shape
of the body which the
highly cultivated races
have undergone. These
modifications occur
chiefly in the pure and
crossed races of the S.
indicus type ; but their
commencement may
be clearly detected in
the slightly improved
bleeds of the S. SCTofa Fipr. 3 — Head of Wild Roar, and of “Oold'^n Days,” a
tvne Yathnsinsj P’" York-hire Latge Breed; the latter- fi-.iin a
ovjije. -L>clLiiUbl US spares photograph. (Copied from Sidney’s edit, of ‘ The
positively (s. 99,103), Pig,’ by Youaa.)
as the result of common experience and of his experiments,
‘ Die Racen des Schweines,’ s. 70. excellent edition of ‘The Pig,’ by
lhe.se woodcuts are copied from Youatt, 1860. See pp. 1, 16, 19.
engravings given in Mr. S. Sidney’s ‘ Schweineschadel,’ s. 74, 135.
76
DOMESTIC PIGS.
CllAP. Ill
that rich and abundant food, given during youth, tends by
some direct action to make the head broader and shorter ;
and that poor food works a contrary result. He lays much
stress on the fact that all wild and semi-domesticated ].hgs,
in ploughing up the ground with their muzzles, have,
whilst young, to exert the powerful muscles fixed to the
hinder part of the head. In highly cultivated races this
habit is no longer followed, and consequently the back c>f
the skull becomes modified in shape, entailing other changes
in other parts. There can hardly be a doubt that so great
a change in habits would affect the skull ; but it seems
rather doubtful how far this will account for the greatly
reduced length of the skull and for its concave front. It is
well known (Nathusius himself advancing many cases,
s. 104) that there is a strong tendency in many domestic
animals — in bull- and pug-dogs, in the niata cattle, in
sheep, in Polish fowls, short-faced tumbler pigeons, and in
one variety of the carp — for the bones of the face to become
greatly shortened. In the case of the dog, as H. Muller has
shown, this seems caused by an abnormal state of the pri-
mordial cartilage. We may, however, readily admit that
abundant and rich food supplied during many generations
would give an inherited tendency to increased size of body,
and that, from disuse, the limbs would become finer and
shorter.^^ We shall in a future chapter see also tliat the
skull and limbs are apparently in some manner correlated,
so that any change in the one tends to affect the other.
Nathusius has remarked, and the observation is an in-
teresting one, that the peculiar form of the skull and body
in the most highly cultivated races is not characteristic of
any one race, but is common to all -when improved up to the
same standard. Thus the large-bodied, long-eared, English
breeds with a convex back, and the small-bodied, short-eared,-
Chinese breeds with a concave back, when bred to the same
state of perfection, nearly resemble each other in the form
of the head and body. This result, it appears, is partly due
to similar causes of change acting on the several races, and
** Nathusius, ‘ Die Racen des Schvveines,’ s. 71.
OllAP. HI.
THEIR VARIATION.
77
partly to man Lreeding tlie pig for one sole purpose, namely,
for the greatest amount of flesh and fat ; so that selection has
always tended towards one and the same end. With most
domestic animals the result of selection has been divergence
of cha]‘acter, here it has been convergence.^^
The nature of the food supplied during many generations
Las apparently affected the length of the intestines-; for,
according to Cuvier, their length to that of the body in
the wild boar is as 9 to 1, — in the common domestic boar as
13-5 to 1, — and in the Siam breed as 16 to 1. In this latter
breed the greater length may be due either to descent from a
distinct species or to more ancient domestication. The number
of mammae vary, as does the period of gestation. The latest
authority says that “the period averages from 17 to 20
weeks,” but 1 think there must be some error in this state-
ment : in M. Tessier’s observations on 25 sows it varied from
109 to 123 days. The Eev. W. D. Fox has given me ten
carefully recorded cases with well-bied pigs, in which the
period varied from 101 to 116 days. According to Nathusius
the period is shortest in the races which come early to ma-
turity ; but the course of their development does not appear
to be actually shortened, for the young animal is born,
judging from the state of the skull, less fully developed, or
in a more embryonic condition, than in the case of common
swine. In the highly cultivated and early matured races
the teeth, also, are developed earlier.
The difference in the number of the vertebrae and ribs in
different kinds of pigs, as observed by Mr. Eyton,^^ and as
given in the following table, has often been quoted. The
African sow probably belongs to the S. scrofa type ; and Mr.
‘Die Raceii des. Schweines,’ s. 47.
‘ Schweineschadel,’ s. 104. Compare,
also, the figures of the old Irish and
the improved Irish breeds in Richard-
son on ‘ The Pig,’ 1847.
Quoted by Isid. Geoffroy, ‘Hist.
Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii. p 441.
S. Sidney, ‘The Pig,’ p. 61.
‘ Schweineschadel,’ s. 2, 20.
‘Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ 1837, p. 23.
1 have not given the caudal vertebrse,
as Mr. Evton savs some might possibly
have been lost. I have added together
the dorsal and lumbar vertebrae, owing
to Prof. Owen’s remarks (‘Journal
Linn. Soc. vol. ii. p. 25) on the difi'er-
ence between dorsal and lumbar
vertebrae depending only on the
development of the ribs. Nevertheless
the difference in the number of the
ribs in pigs deserves notice. M.
Sanson gives the number of lumbar
vertebrae in various pigs ; ‘ Comjjtes
Rendus,’ Lxiii. p. 843.
DOMESTIC PIGS.
Chap. Ill
■ 78
Eyton informs me that, since the publication of this paper,
cross-bred animals from the African and English races were
found by Lord Hill to be perfectly fertile.
English
Long-legged
Male.
Afiican
Female.
Chinese
Male.
Wild Boar
from Cuvier.
Kn nch
D..ine.-.tic
Boar. Iron)
Cuvier.
Dorsal vertebrae ..
15
13
15 j
14
14
luiinbar
t;
6
4
5 i
5
Dorsal arid lumbar 1
together ..
a,
11)
lit
11)
S.icral
5
.5
4
4
4
Total number ofl
vertebrae . . /
2i:
24
23
23 1
23
Some semi-monstrous breeds deserve notice. From the
time of Aristotle to the present time solid-hoofed swine have
occasionally been observed in various parts of the world.
Although this peculiarity is strongly inherited, it is hardly
probable that all the animals with solid hoofs have descended
from the same parents ; it is more probable that the same
peculiarity has reappeared at various times and places. Dr.
Struthers has lately described and figured the structure
of the feet ; in both front and hind feet the distal phalanges
of the two greater toes are represented by a single, great,
hoof-bearing phalanx ; and in the front feet, the middle
phalanges are represented by a bone which is single towards
the lower end, but bears two separate articulations towards
the upper end. From other accounts it appears that an
intermediate toe is likewise sometimes superadded.
Another curious anomaly is offered by the appendages,
described by M. Eudes-Deslongchamps as often characterizing
the Normandy pigs. These appendages are always attached
to the same spot, to the corners of the jaw ; they are cylin-
‘Edinburgh New Philosoph. Blainville’s ‘ Osteographie,’ p. 128, for
Journal,’ April, 1863. See also De various authorities on this subject.
Chap. Ill
THSIK VAEIATION.
79
drical, about three inches in length, covered with bristles,
and with a pencil of bristles rising out of a sinus on one
side : they have a cartilaginous centre, with two small longi-
tudinal muscles : they occur either symmetrically on both
sides of the face or on one side alone. Richardson figures
them on the gaunt old “ Irish Greyhound pig ; ” and ^s^athu-
sius states that they occasionally appear in all the lon^eared
Fig. 4.— Oid Irish Pig, with jaw-appendages. (Copied from H. D. Uichardson on Pigs.)
races, but are not strictly inherited, for they occur or fail in
animals of the same litter.^^ As no wild pigs are known tc
have analogous appendages, we have at present no reason to
suppose that their appearance is due to reversion; and if
this be so, we are forced to admit that a somewhat com-
plex, though apparently useless, structure may be suddenly
developed without the aid of selection.
It is a remarkable fact that the boars of all domesticated
breeds have much shorter tusks than wild boars. Many facts
show that with many animals the state of the hair is much
affected by exposure to, or protection from, climate ; and as
we see that the state of the hair and teeth are correlated in
Turkish dogs (pother analogous facts will be hereafter given),
may we not venture to surmise that the reduction of the tusks
25 Eudes Deslongchamps, ‘ Me - ‘ Pigs, their Origin, &c.,’ 1847, p. 30
moires de la Soc. Linn, de Normandie,' Nathusius, ‘ Die Raceu des Schweines,'
vol. vii., 1842, p. 41. Richardson, 1863, s. 54.
DOMESTIC PIGS.
Chap. Ill
. 80
in the domestic boar is related to liis coat of bristles being
diminished from living under shelter ? On the other hand,
as we shall immediately see, the tusks and bristles reappear
with feral boars, which are no longer protected from the
.weather. It is not surprising that the tusks should be more
affected than the other teeth; as parts developed to serve
as secondary sexual characters are always liable to mucii
variation.
It is a well-known fact that the young of wild European
and Indian pigs,'^^ for the first six months, are longitudinally
banded with light-coloured stripes. This character generally
disappears under domestication. The Turkish domestic pigs,
however, have striped young, as have those of Westphalia,
“whatever maybe their hue;”^'^ whether these latter pigs
belong to the same curly-haired race as the Turkish swine,
I do not know. The pigs which have run wild in Jamaica
and the semi- feral pigs of Kew Granada, both those which
are black and those which are black with a white band across
the stomach, often extending over the back, have resumed
this aboriginal character and produce longitudinally-striped
young. This is likewise the case, at least occasionally, with
the neglected pigs in the Zambesi settlement on the coast oi
Africa.^*
D. Johnson’s ‘ Sketches of Indian
Field Sports,’ p. 272. Mr. Crawfurd
infoi’ms me that the same fact holds
good with the wild pigs of the Malay
peninsula.
For Turkish pigs, see Desmarest,
‘ Mammalogie,’ 1820, p. 391. For
those of Westphalia, see Eichardson’s
‘ Pigs, their Origin, &C;,’ 1847, p. 41.
With respect to the several fore-
going and following statements on
feral pigs, see Koulin, in ‘ 5Iem. pre-
sentes par divers Savans a I’Acad.,’
&c., Paris, tom. vi. 1835, p. 326. It
should be observed that his account
does not apply to truly feral pigs;
but to pigs long introduced into the
country and living in a half-wild
state. For the tiuly feral p'g ^ of
Jamaica, see Gosse’s ‘ Sojourn in
Jamaica,’ 1851, p. 380; and Col
Hamilton Smith, in ‘Nat. Library,
vol. ix. p. 93. With respect to Africa
see Livingstone’s ‘ Expedition to the
Zambesi,’ 1865, p. 153. The most
precise statement with respect to the
tusks of the West Indian feral boars is
by P. Labat (quoted by Roulin) ; out
this author attributes the state of
these pigs to descent from a domestic
stock which he saw in Spain. Admiral
Sulivan, R.N., had ample opportunities
of observing the wild pigs on Eagle
Islet in the Falklands ; and he informs
me that they resembled wild boars
with bristly ridged backs and large
tusks. The pigs which have run wild
in the province of Buenos Ayres
(Rengger, ‘ Saugethiere,’ s. 331) have
not reverted to the wild type. De
Blainville (‘ Osteographie,’ p. .132)
refers to two skulls of domestic pigs
Chap. III.
THEIR CHARACTER WHEN FERAL.
81
The common belief that all domesticated animals, when
they run wild, revert completely to the character of their
parent-stock, is chiefly founded, as far as I can discover, on
feral pigs. BuUeven in this case the belief is not grounded
on sufficient evidence; for the two main types, namely, S,
scrofa and incUcus, have not been distinguished. The young,
as we have just seen, reacquire their longitudinal stripes, and
the boars invariably reassume their tusks. They revert also
in the general shape of their bodies, and in the length of
their legs and muzzles, to the state of the wild animal, as
might have been expected from the amount of exercise which
they are compelled to take in search of food. In Jamaica the
feral pigs do not acquire the full size of the European wild
boar, “ never attaining a greater height than 20 inches at the
shoulder.” In various countries they reassume their original
bristly covering, but in different degrees, dependent on the
climate ; thus, according to Eoulin, the semi-feral pigs in
the hot valleys of New Granada are very scantily clothed ;
whereas, on the Paramos, at the height of 7000 to 8000 feet,
they acquire a thick covering of wool lying under the
bristles, like that on the truly wild pigs of France. These
pigs on the Paramos are small and stunted. The wild boar
of India is said to have the bristles at the end of its tail
arranged like tlie plumes of an arrow, whilst the European
boar has a simple tuft ; and it is a curious fact that many,
but not all, of the feral pigs in Jamaica, derived from a
Spanish stock, have a plumed tail.^^ With respect to colour,,
feral pigs generally revert to that of the wild boar ; but in
certain parts of S. America, as we have seen, some of the
semi-feral pigs have a curious white band across their
stomachs ; and in certain other hot places the pigs are red,
and this colour has likewise occasionally been observed in
sent fiom Patagonia by Al. d’Orbigny,
tiud he states that they have the
ocoipital elevation of the wild European
boar, but that the head altogether is
plus courte et plus ramassee.” He
refers, also, to the skin of a feral pig
from North America, and says, “il
ressemble tout a fait a un petit sang-
V
lier, mais il est presque tout noir, ct
peut-etre un peu plus ramasse dans
ses formes.”
Gosse’s ‘ .Jamaica,’ p. 386, with a
quotation from Williamson’s ‘ Oriental
Field Sports.’ Also Col. Hamilton
Smith, in ‘ Naturalist Library,’ vol
ix. p. 04.
82
CATTLE.
Chav. Ill
the feral pigs of Jamaica. From these several facts we see
that with pigs when feral there is a strong tendency to
revert to the wild type; but that this tendency is largely
governed by the nature of the climate, ampunt of exercise,
and other causes of change to which they have been
Bubjo-Dted.
The last point worth notice is that we have unusually good
evidence of breeds of pigs now keeping perfectly true, which
have been formed by the crossing of several distinct breeds.
The Improved Essex pigs, for instance, breed very true ; but
there is no doubt that they largely owe their present excellent
qualities to crosses originally made by Lord Western with the
Neapolitan race, and to subsequent crosses with the Berkshire
breed (this also having been improved by Neapolitan crosses),
, and likewise, probably, with the Sussex breed. In breeds
thus formed by complex crosses, the most careful and unre-
mitting selection during many generations has been found to be
indispensable. Chiefly in consequence of so much crossing,
some well-known breeds have undergone rapid changes ; thus,
according to Nathusius,^^ the Berkshire breed of 1780 is quite
different from that of 1810 ; and, since this latter period, at
least two distinct forms have borne the same name.
Cattle.
Domestic cattle are certainly the descendants of more than
one wild form, in the same manner as has been shown to be the
case with our dogs and pigs. Naturalists have generally
made two main divisions of cattle : the humped kinds inhabit-
ing tropical countries, called in India Zebus, to which the
specific name of Bos indicus has been given ; and the common
non -humped cattle, generally included under the name ol
Bos taurus. The humped cattle were domesticated, as may
be seen on the Egyptian monuments, at least as early as the
twelfth dynasty, that is 2100 b.c. They differ from common
cattle in various osteological characters, even in a greater
• S. Sidney’s edition of ‘ Youatt on ‘ Schweinesrhadel,’ s 140.
file Pig,’ 1860, pp. 7, 26, 27, 29, 30.
Chap. III.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
88
degree, according to Eutimeyer,-'^^ than do the fossil and
prehistoric European species, namely. Bos 'primigenius and
longifrons, from each other. They differ, also, as Mr. Blyth,^^
who has particularly attended to this subject, remarks, in
general configuration, in the shape of their ears, in the point
where the dewlap commences, in the typical curvature of
their horns, in their manner of carrying their heads when "at
reot, in their ordinary variations of colour, especially in the
frequent presence of “ nilgau-like markings on their feet,”
and “ in the one being born with teeth protruding through
the jaws, and the other not so.” They have different habits,
and their voice is entirely different. The humped cattle in
India “ seldom seek shade, and never go into the wmter and
there stand knee-deep, like the cattle of Europe.” They have
run wild in parts of Oude and Eohilcund, and can maintain
themselves in a region infested by tigers. They have given
rise to many races differing greatly in size, in the presence
of one or two humps, in length of horns, and other respects.
Mr. Blyth sums up emphatically that the humped and hump-
less cattle must be considered as distinct species. When we
consider the number of points in external structure and
habits, independently of important osteological differences, in
which they differ from each other ; and that many of these
points are not likely to have been affected by domestication,
there can hardly be a doubt, notwithstanding the adverse
opinion of some naturalists, that the humped and non-humped
cattle must be ranked as specifically distinct.
The European breeds of humpless cattle are numerous.
Professor Low enumerates 19 British breeds, only a few of
which are identical with those on the Continent. Even the
email Channel islands of Guernsey, Jersey, and Alderney
‘Die Fauna der Pfahlbauten,’
1861, s. 109, 149, 222. See also
Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, in ‘ Mem. du
Mus. d’Hist. Nat.,’ tom. x. p. 172 ;
and his son Isidore, in ‘ Hist. Nat.
Gen.,’ tom. iii. p. 69. Vasey, in his
‘Deaneations of the Ox Tribe,’ 1851,
p. 127, says the zebu has four, and
common ox five, sacral vertebrje.
Mr. Hodgson found the ribs either
thirteen or fourteen in number ; see a
note in ‘Indian Field,’ 1858, p. 62.
‘ The Indian Field,’ 1858, p. 74,
where Mr. Blyth gives his authorities
with respect to the feral humped
cattle. Pickering, also, in his ‘ Races
of Man,’ 1850, p. 274, notices the
peculiar grunt-like character of the
voice of the humped cattle.
84
CAT'l’LE.
ClIAl*. Ill
possess tlieir own sub-breeds ; and these again differ from
the cattle of the other British islands, such as Anglesea, and
the western isles of Scotland. Desmarest, who jDaid attention
to tlio subject, describes 15 French races, excluding sub-
varieties and those imported from other countries. In other
parts of Europe there are several distinct races, such as the
pale-coloured Hungarian cattle, with their light and free
step, and enormous horns sometimes measuring above five
feet from tip to tip : the Podolian cattle also are remarkable
from the height of their fore-quarters. In the most recent
work on Cattle,^*" engravings are given of fifty-five European
breeds ; it is, however, probable that several of these differ
very little from each other, or are merely synonyms. It must
not be supposed that numerous breeds of cattle exist only in
jong-civilized countries, for we shall presently see that several
kinds are kept by the savages of Southern Africa.
With respect to the parentage of the several European breeds,
we already know much from Nilsson’s Memoir/^ and more especially
from Eiitimeyer’s works and those of Boyd Dawkins. Two or tlu’ee
species or forms of Bos, closely allied to still living domestic races,
have been found in the more recent tertiary deposits or amongst
prehistoric remains in Europe. Following Eutimeyer, we have : —
Bos priinigenius. — This magnificent, well known species was
domesticated in Switzerland during the Neolithic period ; even at
this early period it varied a little, having apparently been crossed
with other races. Some of the larger races on the Continent, as the
Friesland, &c., and the Pembroke race in England, closely resemble
in essential structure B. primigenius, and no doubt are its descen-
dants. This is likewise the opinion of Nilsson. Bos primigenius
existed as a wild animal in Caesar’s time, and is now semi-wild,
though much degenerated in size, in the park of Chillingham ; for
I am informed by Professor Eutimeyer, to whom Lord Tanker ville
sent a skull, that the Chillingham cattle are less altered from the
true primigenius type than any other known breed.®^
Mr. H. E. Marquand, in ‘The
Times,’ June 2ord, 1856.
^asey, ‘ Delineations of the Ox-
Tribe, p. 124. Brace’s ‘ Hungary,’
1851, p. 94. The Hungarian cattle
descend, according to Rutimeyer
(‘Zahmen Europ. Rindes,’ 1866, s, 13
from Bos primigenius.
Moll and Gayot, ‘ La Connais-
sance Geh. du Boeuf,’ Paris, 1860,
Fig. 82 is that of the Podolian bree‘1.
A translation appeared in thiee
parts in the ‘ Annals and Mag. of Nat.
Hist.,’ 2nd series, vol. iv., 1849.
&'(?, also, Riitimeyer’s ‘ Beitrii^e
pal. Gesch. der Wiederkaner Bas-i,
1865, s. 54.
Chai’. III.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
85
Bos trochoceros. — This form is not included in the three species
above mentioned, for it is now considered by Euiimeyer to be the
female of an early domesticated form of B. primigenius, and as the
progenitor of hi&frontosus race. I may add that specific names have
been given to four other fossil oxen, now believed to be identical
with B. primigenius?^
Bos longifrons (or brachyceros) of Owen. — This very distinct species
was of small size, and had a short body with fine legs. According
to Eoyd Dawkins^® it was introduced as a domesticated animaLinto
Britain at a very early period, and supplied food to the Roman
legionaries.^^ Some remains have been found in Ireland in certain
crannoges, of which the dates are believed to be from 843-933
It was also the commonest form in a domesticated condition in
Switzerland during the earliest part of the Neolithic period. Pro-
fessor Owen^-'^ thinks it probable that the Welsh and Highland cattle
are descended from this form ; as likewise is the case, according to
Riitimeyer, with some of the existing Swiss breeds. These latter
are of different shades of colour from light-grey to blackish-brown,
with a lighter stripe along the spine, but they have no pure white
marks. The cattle of North Wales and the Highlands, on the other
hand, are generally black or dark-coloured.
Bos frontosus of Nilsson. — This species is allied to B. longifrons,
and, according to the high authority of Mr. Boyd Dawkins, is identical
with it, but in the opinion of some judges is distinct. Both co existed
in Scania during the same late geological period,^* and both have
been found in the Irish crannoges.^^ Nilsson believes that his
B. frontosus may be the parent of the mountain cattle of Norway,
which have a high protuberance on the skull between the base of
the horns. As Professor Owen and others believe that the Scotch
Highland cattle are descended from his B. longifrons, it is worth
notice that a capable judge has remarked that he saw no cattle
in Norway like the Highland breed, but that they more nearly
resembled the Devonshire breed.
On the whole we may conclude, more especially from the
researches of Boyd Dawkins, that European cattle are
Pictet’s ‘ Palebntologie,’ tom i. p.
365 (2nd edit.). With respect to B.
trochoceros, see Riitimeyer’s ‘ Zahmen
Europ. Rindes,’ 1866, s. 26.
W. Boyd Dawkins on the British
Fossil Oxen,’ ‘Journal of the Geolog.
Soc.,’ Aug. 1867, p. 182. Also ‘ Proc.
Phil. Soc. of Manchester,’ Nov. 14,
1871, and ‘Cave Hunting,’ 1875, p.
27, 138.
‘ British Pleistocene Mammalia,’
by W. B. Dawkins and W. A. Sandford,
1*866, p. XV.
R. Wilde, ‘An Essay on the
Animal Remains, &c. Royal Irish
Academy,’ 1860, p. 29. Also ‘ Proc.
of R. Irish Academy,’ 1858, p. 48.
‘ Lecture : Royal Institution of G.
Britain,’ May 2nd, 1856, p. 4.
‘ British Fossil Mammals,* p. 513.
Nilsson, in ‘Annals and Mag. of
Nat. Hist.,’ 1849, vol. iv. p. 354.
See W. R. Wilde, ut supra ; and
Mr. Blythe, in ‘ Proc. Irish Academy,’
March 5th, 1864.
Laing’s ‘ Tour in Norway,’ p
no.
86
CATTLE.
Cha.-. Ill
dosceiiiled from two species ; and there is no improbahility
ill this fact, for the genus Bos readily yields to domestication.
Besides these two sjDecies and the zebu, the yak, the gay a],
and the arni (not to mention the buffalo or genus Bubalus)
liave been domesticated; making altogether six species of
Bos. The zebu and the two EurojDean species are now extinct
ill a wild state. Although certain races of cattle were
domesticated at a very ancient period in Europe, it does net
follow that they were first domesticated here. Those who
place much reliance on philology argue that they were imported
from the East."^*^ It is probable that they originally inhabited
a temperate or cold climate, but not a land long coyered with
snow; for our cattle, as we have seen in the chapter on
Horses, have not the instinct of scraping away the snow to
get at the herbage beneath. No one could behold the magni-
ficent wild bulls on the bleak Falkland Islands in the southern
hemisphere, and doubt about the climate being admirably
suited to them. Azara has remarked that in the temperate
regions of La Plata the cows conceive when two years old,
whilst in the much hotter country of Paraguay they do not
conceive till three ^^ears old ; “ from which fact,” as he adds,
“ one may conclude that cattle do not succeed so well in warm
countries.”
Bos primigenus and longifrons have been ranked by nearly
all palaeontologists as distinct species ; and it would not be
reasonable to take a different view simply because their
domesticated descendants now intercross with the utmost
freedom. All the European breeds have so often been crossed
both intentionally and unintentionally, that, if any steri-
lity had ensued from such unions, it would certainly have
been detected. As zebus inhabit a distant and much hotter
region, and as they differ in so many characters from our
European cattle, I have taken pains to ascertain whether the
two forms are fertile when crossed. The late Lord Powis
imported some zebus and crossed them with common cattle
in Shropshire ; and I was assured by his steward that the
" Isid. Geoffroy Saint-Hi'airc, ‘ Quadruples du Paraguay,’ tom
Hist. Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii. 98. ii. p. 360.
Idem, tom. iii. pp. 82, 91.
Chap III.
CROSSED SPECIES FERTILE.
87
cross-bred animals were perfectly fertile with both parent-
stocks. Mr. Blyth informs me that in India h3^brids, with
various proportions of either blood, are quite fertile ; and this
can hardly fail to be known, for in some districts the two
species are allowed to breed freely together. Most of the
cattle which were first introduced into Ihsmania were
humped, so that at one time thousands of crossed animals
i)xisted there; and Mr. B. O’Neile Wilson, M. A., writes to
me from Tasmania that he has never heard of any sterility
having been observed. He himself formerly possessed a
herd of such crossed cattle, and all were perfectly fertile ; so
much so, that he cannot remember even a single cow failing
to calve. These several facts afford an important confirma-
tion of the Pallasian doctrine that the descendants of species
which when first domesticated would if crossed have been
in all probability in some degree sterile, become perfectl}'
fertile after a long course of domestication. In a future
chapter we shall see that this doctrine throws some light on
the difficult subject of Hybridism.
I have alluded to the cattle in Chillingham Park, which,
according to Riitimej^er, have been very little changed from
fhQ Bos pimigenias This park is so ancient that it is
referred to in a record of the j^ear 1220. I’he cattle in their
instincts and habits are truly wold. They are white, with
the inside of the ears reddish-brown, eyes rimmed with black,
muzzles brown, hoofs black, and horns white tipped with
black. Within a period of thirty-three years about a dozen
cak es were born with “ brown and blue spots upon the
cheeks or necks; but these, together with any defective
animals, were alwa^^s destroyed.” According to Bewick,
about the year 1770 some cklves appeared with black ears;
but these were also destroyed b}^ the keeper, and black caia
have not since reappeared. The wild white cattle in the
Duke of Hamilton’s park, where I have heard of the birth
of a bhick calf, are said b}" Lord Tankerville to be inferior to
those at Chillingham. The cattle kept until the year 1780
by the Duke of Queensberry, but now extinct, had their ears,
muzzle, and orbits of the eyes black. Tho.se which have
Walther, ‘ Das Riiidvieh,’ 1817, s. 30.
88
CATTLE.
Chap. Ill
existed from time immeiijorial at Cliartley, closely resemble
the cattle at Oliillingham, but are larger, “ with some small
difference in the colour of tlie ears.” “ They frequently tend
to become entirely black; and a singular superstition prevails
in the vicinity that, when a black calf is bom, some calamity
impends over the noble house of Ferrers. All the black
calves are destroyed.” The cattle at Burton Constable in
Yorkshire, now extinct, had ears, muzzle, and the tip of the
tail black. Those at Gisburne, also in Yorkshire, are said by
Bewick to have been sometimes without dark muzzles, with
the inside alone of the ears brown; and they are elsewhere
said to have been low in stature and hornless.
The several above-specified differences in the park-cattle,
slight though they be, are worth recording, as they show that
animals living nearly in a state of nature, and exposed to
nearly uniform conditions, if not allowed to roam fieely and
to cross with other herds, do not keep as uniform as truly
wild animals. For the preservation of a uniform character,
even within the same park, a certain degree of selection — that
is, the destruction of the dark-coluured calves — is apparently
necessary.
Boyd Dawkins believes that the park-caitle are descended
from anciently domesticated, and not truly wild animals ;
and from the occasional appearance of dark-coloured calves,
it is improbable th.at the aboriginal Bos primigenius wsis white.
It is curious what a strong, though not invariable, tendency
there is in wild or escaped cattle to become white with
coloured ears, under widely different conditions of life. If
the old writers Boethius and Leslie can be trusted, the
** I am much indebted to the
present Earl of Tankerville for infor-
mation about his wild cattle ; and for
the skull which was sent to Prof.
Kiitimsyer. The fullest account of
the Chillingham cattle is given by
Mr. Hindmarsh, together with a
letter by the late Lord Tankerville,
in ‘Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’
vol. ii., 1839, p. 274. See Bewick,
‘Quadrupeds,’ 2nd edit., 1791, p. 35,
note With respect to those of the
Duke of Queensberry, S"e Pennant’s
‘Tour in Scotland,’ p. i09. For those
of Chartley, see Low’s ‘ Domesticated
Animals of Britain,’ 1845, p. 238.
For those of Gisburne, see Bewick’s
‘ Quadrupeds,’ and ‘ Encyclop. of Rural
Sports,’ p. 101.
Boethius was born in 1470(
‘Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’ vol
ii., 1839, p. 281; and vol. iv. 1819
p. 424.
Chap. III.
PARK-CATTLE.
89
wild cattle of Scotland were wHte and furnislied with a great
mane ; but the colour of their ears is not mentioned. In
Wales, during the tenth century, some of the cattle are
described as being white with red ears. Four hundred cattle
thus coloured were sent to King John ; and an early record
speaks of a hundred cattle with red ears having been de-
manded as a compensation for some offence, but, if tlpe cattle
were of a dark or black colour, 150 were to be presented.
The black cattle of North Wales apparently belong, as wo
have seen, to the small longifrons type : and as the alter-
native was offered of either 150 dark cattle, or 100 white
cattle with red ears, we may piesume that the latter
were the larger beasts, and probabl}' belonged to the
'primigenius t}'pe. Youatt has remarked that at the present
day, whenever cattle of the short-horn breed are white, the
extremities of their ears are more or less tinged with red.
The cattle which have run wild on the Pampas, in Texas,
and in two parts of Africa, have become of a nearly uniform
dark brownish-red.^^ On the Ladrone Islands, in the Pacific
Ocean, immense herds of cattle, which were wild in the year
1741, are described as “ milk-white, except their ears, which
are generally black.” The Falkland Islands, situated far
south, with all the conditions of life as different as it is
possible to conceive from those of the Ladrones, offer a more
interesting case. Cattle have run wild the e during eighty
or ninety ^^ear.s ; and in the southern districts the animals
are mostly white, with their feet, or whole heads, or only
their ears black ; but my informant. Admiral Sulivan,^® who
long resided on these islands, does not believe that they are
ever purely white. So that in these two archipelagos we see
that the cattle tend to become white with coloured ears. In
other parts of the Falkland Islands other colours prevail :
near Port Pleasant brown is the common tint ; round Mount
Youatt on Cattle, 1834, p. 48:
See also p. 242, on short-horn cattle.
Bell, in his ‘ British Quadrupeds,’ p.
423, states that, after long attending
to the subject, he has found that
v/^hite cattle invariably have coloured
ears.
Azara, ‘Quadruples du Para-
guay,’ tom. ii. p. 361. Azara
quotes Buffon for the feral cattle of
Africa. For Texas, see ‘Times,’ Feb.
18, 1846.
Anson’s Voyage. See Kerr and
Porter’s ‘ Collection,’ vol. xii. p. 103.
See also Mr. Mackinnou’s pam*
phlet on the Falkland Islands, p 24.
90
CATTLE.
Chap. III.
Usborn, about half the animals in some of the herds were
lead- or mouse-coloured, which elsewhere is an unusual tint.
These latter cattle, though generally inhabiting high land,
breed about a month earlier than the other cattle ; and this
circumstance would aid in keeping them distinct and in per-
petuating a peculiar colour. It is worth recalling to mind
tliat blue or lead-coloured marks have occasionally appeared
on the white cattle of Chillingham. So plainly different
were the colours of the wild herds in different paits of the
Falkland Islands, that in hunting them, as Admiral Sulivan
informs me, white spots in one district, and dark spots in
another district, were alwaj’s looked out for on the distant
hills. In the intermediate districts, intermediate colours
prevailed. Whatever the cause may be, this tendency in the
wild cattle of the Falkland Islands, which are all descended
from a few brought from La Plata, to break up into herds of
three diferent colours, is an interesting fact.
Eeturning to the several British breeds, the conspicuous
difference in general appearance between Short-horns, Long-
horns (now rarely seen), Hereford.s, Highland cattle, Alder-
neys, &c., must be familiar to every one, A part of this
difference may be attributed to descent from primordially
distinct species ; but we may feel sure that there has been
a considerable amount of variation. Even during the Neo-
lithic period, the domestic cattle were to a certain extent
variable. Within recent times most of the breeds have been
modified by careful and methodical selection. How strongly
the characters thus acquired are inherited, may be inferred
from the prices realised by the improved breeds ; even at
the first sale of Ceiling’s Short-horns, eleven bulls reached an
average of 214Z., and lately Short-horn bulls have been sold
for a thousand guineas, and have been exported to all quarters
of the world.
Some constitutional differences may be here noticed. The
Short-horns arrive at maturity far earlier than the wilder
breeds, such as those of Wales or the Highlands. This fact
has been shown in an interesting manner by Mr. Siinonds,^^
‘The Asje of the Ox, Sheep, Pig,’ &c., by Prof. James SimcaJs, published
by order of the Royal Agricult. Soc.
Celap. III.
THEIK VARIATION.
91
vvh.0 lias given a taLle of tlie average period of tlieir denti-
tion, v^hicli proves that there is a difference of no less than
six months in the appearance of the permanent incisors. The
period of gestation, from observations made by Tessicr on
1131 cows, varies to the extent of eighty-one days; and what
is more interesting, ]\1. Lefour affirms “ that the period of
gestation is longer in the large German cattle than Jn the
smaller breeds.” With respect to the period of conception,
it seems certain that Alderney and Zetland cows often become
pregnant earlier than other breeds.^^ Lastly, as four fully
developed mammae is a generic character in the genus Bo
it is worth notice that with our domestic cows the two rudi-
mentary mammae often become fairly well developed and
yield milk.
As numerous breeds are generally found only in long-
civilized countries, it may be well to show that in some
countries inhabited by barbarous races, who are frequently
at war with each other, and therefore have little free commu-
nication, several distinct breeds of cattle now exist or for-
merly existed. At the Cape of Good Hope Leguat observed,
in the year 1720, three kinds. At the present day various
travellers have noticed the differences in the breeds in
Southern Africa. Sir Andrew Smith several years ago
remarked to me that the cattle possessed by the different
tribes of Caffres, though living near each other under the
same latitude and in the same kind of country, yet differed,
and he expressed much surprise at the fa(;t. Mr. Andersson
has descri! ed the Damara, Bechuana, and Namaqua cattle;
and he informs me in a letter that the cattle north of Lake
Ngami are likewise different, as Mr. Galton has heard is also
‘Ann. Agrioult. France,’ April,
18J7, as quoted in ‘The Veterinary,’
rol. xii. p. 725. I quote Tessier’s obser-
vations from Youatt on Cattle, p.
527.
‘ The Veterinary,' vol. viii. p.
681, and vol. x. p. 268. Low’s
' Domest. Animals, p. 297.
Mr.. Ogleby, in ‘ Proc. Zoolog.
Soc.,’ 1836, p. 138, and 1840, p. 4.
Quatj'efages quotes Philippi (‘ Revue
des Cours Scientifiques,’ Feb. 12, 1688,
p. 657), that the cattle of Piacentino
have thirteen dorsal vertebrae and ribs
in»the place of the ordinary number
of twelve.
Leguat’s Voyage, quoted by
Vasey in his ‘ Delineations of the Ox-
tribe,’ p. 132.
‘Travels in South Africa,’ pp.
317, 336.
CATTLE.
Chap. III.
• 92
the case with the cattle of Benguela. The Namaqiia cattle
in size and shape nearly lesemhle European cattle, and have
short stout horns and large hoofs. The Damara cattle are
very peculiar, l)eing big-boned, with slender legs, and small
hal'd feet ; their tails are adorned with a tuft of long bushy
hair nearly touching the ground, and their horns are extra-
ordinarily large. Tlie Bechuana cattle have even larger horns,
and there is now a skull in London with the two horns
8 ft. 8 J in. long, as measured in a straight line from tip to tip,
and no less than 13 ft. 5 in. as measured along their curva-
ture ! Mr. Andersson in his letter to me says that, though
he will not venture to describe the differences between the
breeds belonging to the many different sub-tribes, yet such
certainly exist, as shown by the wonderful facility with
which the natives discriminate them.
That many breeds of cattle have originated through
variation, independently of descent from distinct species, we
may infer from what vt^e see in South America, where the
genus Bos was not endemic, and where the cattle which now
exist in such vast numbers are the descendants of a few
imported from Spain and Portugal. In Columbia, Poulin
describes two peculiar breeds, namely, pelones, with extremely
thin and fine hair, and calongos, absolutely naked. According
to Castelnau there are two. races in Brazil, one like European
cattle, the other different, with remarkable horns. In Para-
guay, Azara de. cribes a breed which certainly originated
in S. America, called chivos, “ because they have straight
vertical horns, conical, and very large at the base.” He
likewise describes a dwarf race in Corrientes, with short
legs and a body larger than usual. Cattle without horns,
and others with reversed hair, have also originated in
Paraguay.
Another monstrous breed, called niatas or natas, of which I
saw two small herds on the? northern bank of the Plata, is so
remarkable as to deserve a fuller description. This breed bears
the same relation to other breeds, as bull or pug dogs do to
‘ Mem. de I’lustitut present, par June 15, 184-6. See Azaxa, ‘Quadru-
livers Savans,’ tom. vi., 1835, p. 333. pfedes du Paraguay, tom. ii. pp. 359
Fui Br azil, see ‘ Comptes Rendus,’ 361.
Chap. III.
THEIR VARIATION.
93
other dogs, or as improved pigs, according to H. von Nathnsiiis,
do to common pigs.®^ Eiitimeyer believes that these cattle
belong to the primigenius type.®^ The forehead is very short
and broad, with the nasal end of the skull, together with
the whole plane of the upper molar-teeth, curved upwards.
The lower jaw projects beyond the upper, and has a corre-
sponding upward curvature. It is an interesting fact that
an almost similar confirmation characterizes, as I am informed
by Dr. Falconer, the extinct and gigantic Sivatherium of
India, and is not known in any other ruminant. The upper
lip is much drawn back, the nostrils are seated high up and
are Avidely open, the eyes project outwards, and the horns
are large. In walking the head is carried low, and the neck
is short. The hind legs appear to be longer, compared Avith
the front legs, than is usual. The exposed incisor teeth, the
short head and upturned nostrils, give these cattle the most
ludicrous, self-confident air of defiance. The skull which I
presented to the College of Surgeons has been thus described
by Professor Owen : “ It is remarkable from the stunted
development of the nasals, premaxillaries, and fore-part of
the lower jaw, which is unusually curved upwards to come
into contact with the premaxillaries. The nasal bones are
about one-third the ordinary length, but retain almost their
normal breadth. The triangular vacuity is left between
them, the frontal and lachrymal, which latter bone articulates
with the premaxillary, and thus excludes the maxillary from
any junction with the nasal.” So that even the con-
nexion of some of the bones is changed. Other differences
might be added ; thus the plane of the condyles is somewha t
‘ Schweineschiidel,’ 1864, s. 104.
Nathusius states that the form of
skull characteristic in the niata cattle
occasionally appears in European
cattle ; bxit he is mistaken, as we
shall hereafter see, in supposing that
these cattle do not form a distinct
race. Prof. Wyman, of Cambridge,
United States, informs me that the
common cod-fish presents a similar
monstrosity, called by the fishermen
bull-dog cod.” Prof. Wyman also
concluded, after making numerous
inquiries in La Plata, that the niata
cattle transmit their peculiarities or
form a race.
Ueber Art des zahmen Europ.
Riudes, 1866, s. 28.
‘ Descriptive Cat. of Ost. Collect,
of College of Surgeons,’ 1853, p. 624.
Vasey. in his ‘ Delineations of the Ox-
tribe,’ has given a figure of this skull;
and I sent a photograph of it to Prof
Rutimeyer,
CATTLE.
ClIAI in
94
modified, and tlio terminal edge of the premaxillaries forms an
areli. In fact, on comparison with the skull of a common ox,
scarcely a single hone presents the same exact shape, and the
wliole skull has a wonderfully different appearance.
The first brief published notice of this race was by Azara,
between the years 1783-96 ; but Don F. Muniz, of Luxan, who
has kindly collected information for me, states that about 1760
tliese cattle were kept as curiosities near Buenos Ayres.
Their origin is not positively known, but they must have ori-
ginated subsequently to' the year 1552, when cattle were first
introduced. Senor Muniz informs me that the breed is believed
to have originated with the Indians southward of the Plata.
Even to this day those reared near the Plata show their less
civilized nature in being fiercer than common cattle, and in the
cow, if visited too often, easily deserting her first calf. The
breed is very true, and a niata bull and cow invariably produce
niata calves. The breed has already lasted at least a century.
A niata bull crossed with a common cow, and the reverse cross,
yield oftspring having an intermediate character, but with
the niata character strongly displayed. According to Senor
Muniz, there is the clearest evidence, contrary to the common
belief of agriculturists in analogous cases, that the niata cow
when crossed with a common bull transmits her peculiarities
more, strongly than does the niata bull when crossed with a
common cow. When the pasture is tolerably long, these cattle
feed, as well as common cattle with their tongue and palate ; but
during the great droughts, when so many animals perish on the
Pampas, the niata breed lies under a great disadvantage, and
would, if not attended to, become extinct ; for the common
cattle, like horses, are able to keep alive by browsing with
their lips on the twigs of trees and on reeds : this the niatas
cannot so well do, as their lips do not join, and hence they are
found to perish before the common cattle. This strikes mo
as a good illustration of hoAv little we are able to judge from
the ordinary habits of an animal, on what circumstances,
occurring only at long intervals of time, its rarity or extinc-
tion may depend. It shows us, also, how natural selection
would have determined the rejection of the niata modification
had it arisen in a state of nature.
Chap. III.
CAUSES OF YAKIATION.
95
Having described the semi-monstrons niata breed, I may
allude to a white bull, said to have been brought from Africa,
which was exhibited in London in 1829, and which has been
well figured by Mr. Harvey.®'^ It had a hump, and was fur-
nished with a mane. The dewlap was peculiar, being divided
between its fore-legs into parallel divisions. Its lateral hoofs
were annually shed, and grew to the length of five or six inches.
The eye was very peculiar, being remarkably prominent, and
“ resembled a cup and ball, thus enabling the animal to see
on all sides with equal ease ; the pupil was small and oval, or
rather a parallelogram with the ends cut off, and lying trans-
versely across the ball.” A new and strange breed might
probably havv) been formed by careful breeding and selection
from this animal.
I have often speculated on the probable causes through
which each separate district in Great Britain came to possess
in former times its own peculiar breed of cattle ; and the ques-
tion is, perhaps, even more perplexing in the case of Southern
Africa. We now know that the differences may be in part
attributed to descent from distinct species ; but this cause is
far from sufficient. Have the slight differences in climate
and in the nature of the pasture, in the different districts of
Britain, directly induced corresponding differences in the
cattle? We have seen that the semi -wild cattle in the
several British parks are not identical in colouring or size,
and that some degree of selection has been requisite to keep
them true. It is almost certain that abundant food given
during many generations directly affects the size of a breed.®^
That climate directly affects the thickness of the skin and
the hair is likewise certain : thus Eoulin asserts that the
hides of the feral cattle on the hot Llanos “ are always much
less heavy than those of the cattle raised on the high plat-
form of Bogota ; and that these hides yield in weight and in
thickness of hair to those of the cattle which have run wild
oil the lofty Paramos. ’ The same difference has been observed
Loudon 3 Magazine of Nat. Low, ‘ Domesticated Animals ol
Hist.,’ Yol. i., 1829, p. 113. Separate the British Isles,’ p. 264.
figures are given of the animal, its
hoofs, eye, and dewlap.
‘ Mem. de I’lnstitut present, par
divers Savans,’ tom. vi., 1835, p. 332
96
CATTLE.
Chap. Ill
in the hides of the cattle reared on the bleak Falkland Islands
and on the temperate Pampas. Low has remarked that the
cattle which inhabit the more humid parts of Britain have
longer hair and thicker skins than other British cattle.
When we compare highly improved stall-fed cattle with tho
wilder breeds, or compare mountain and lowland breeds, wo
cannot doubt that an active life, leading to the free use of
the limbs and lungs, affects the shape and proportions of the
whole body. It is probable that some breeds, such as the semi-
monstrous niata cattle, and some peculiarities, such as being
hornless, &c., have appeared suddenly owing to what we may
call in our ignorance spontaneous variation ; but even in this
case a rude kind of selection is necessary, and the animals
thus characterized must be at least partially separated from
others. This degree of care, however, has sometimes been
taken even in little-civilized districts, where we should least
have expected it, as in the case of the niata, chivo, and horn-
less cattle in S. America.
That methodical selection has done wonders within a recent
period in modifying our cattle, no one doubts. During the
process of methodical selection it has occasionally happened that
deviations of structure, more strongly j)ronounced than mere
individual differences, yet by no means deserving to be called
monstrosities, have been taken advantage of ; thus the famous
Long-horn Bull, Shakespeare, though of the pure Canley
stock, “ scarcely inherited a single point of the long-horned
breed, his horns excepted ; yet in the hands of Mr. Fowler,
this bull greatly improved his race. We have also reason to
believe that selection, carried on so far unconsciously that there
was at no one time any distinct intention to improve or change
the breed, has in the course of time modified most of our
cattle ; for by this process, aided by more abundant food, all the
lowland British breeds have increased greatly in size and in
early maturity since the reign of Henry YII.^^ should
never be forgotten that many animals have to be annually
Llom, pp. 304, 368, &c. Yonatt on Cattle, p. 116. Lord
Youatt on Cattle, p. 193. A full ?7'encer has written on this same
account of this bull is taken from subject
Warshall.
Chap. III.
SHEEP; THEIK VARIATION.
97
slaaghtcrecl ; so that each owner must determine which shall
be killed and which preserved for breeding. In every district,
as Youatt has remarked, there is a prejudice in favour of the
native breed ; so that animals possessing qualities, whatever
they may be, which are most valued in each district, will be
oftenest preserved ; and this unmethodical selection assuredly
will in the long run affect the character of the whole breed.
But it may be asked, can this rude kind of selection have been
practised by barbarians such as those of southern Africa ? In
a future chapter on- Selection we shall see that this has
certainly occurred to some extent. Therefore, looking to the
origin of the many breeds .of cattle which formerly inhabited
the several districts of Britain, I conclude that, although
slight differences in the nature of the climate, food, &c., as
well as changed habits of life, aided by correlation of growth,
and the occasional appearance from unknown causes of con-
siderable deviations of structure, have all probably pla3,ed
their parts ; yet that the occasional preservation in each
district of those individual animals which were most valued
by each owner has perhaps been even moi e effective in the
2u-oduction of the several British breeds. As soon as two or
more breeds were formed in any district, or when new breeds
descended from distinct species were introduced, their crossing,
especially if aided by some selection, will have multiplied the
number and modified the characters of the older breeds.
Sheep.
I SHALL treat this subject briefly. Most authors look at our
domestic sheep as descended from several distinct species.
Mr. Blyth, who has carefully attended to the subject, believes
that fourteen wild species now exist, but “ that not one of
them can be identified as the progenitor of any one of the
interminable domestic races.” M. Gervais thinks that
there are six species of Ovis,”^^ but that our domestic sheep
form a distinct genus, now completely extinct. A German
Blyth, on the genus Ovis, in Mr. Blyth’s excellent articles in ‘ Land
‘Annals and Mag. of Nat. History,’ and Water,’ 1867, pp. 134, 156.
vol. vii., 1841, p. 261. With respect Gervais, ‘Hist. Nat. des Mammiferes,
to the parentage of the breeds, see 1855, tom. ii. p. 191.
8
98
SHEEP :
Chaf. Ill,
naturalist'^ believes that our sbeep descend from ten aborigi-
nally distinct species, of wliich only one is still living in a wild
state I Another ingenious observer, though not a naturalist,
with a bold defiance of everything known on geographical dis-
tribution, infers that the sheep of Great Britain alone are the
descendants of eleven endemic British forms ! Under such
a hopeless state of doubt it would be useless for my purpose
to give a detailed account of the several breeds ; but a few
remarks may be added.
Sheep have been domesticated from a very ancient period,
Eiitimeyer found in the Swiss lake-dwellings the remains of
a small breed, with thin tall legs, and horns like those of a
goat, thus differing somewhat from any kind now known.
Almost every country has its own peculiar breed ; and many
countries have several breeds differing greatly from each other.
One of the most strongly marked races is an Eastern one with
a Icng tail, including, according to Pallas, twenty vertebrae,
and so loaded with fat that it is sometimes placed on a truck,
which is dragged about by the living animal. These sheep,
though ranked by Pitzinger as a distinct aboriginal form,
bear in their drooping ears the stamp of long domestication.
This is likewise the case with those sheep which have two
great masses of fat on the rump, with the tail in a rudimen-
tary condition. The Angola variety of the long-tailed race
has curious masses of fat on the back of the head and beneath
the jaws.'^^ Mr. Hodgson in an admirable paper on the
sheep of the Himalaya infers from the distribution of the
several races, “ that this caudal augmentation in most of its
phases is an instance of degeneracy in these pre-eminently
Alpine animals.” The horns present an endless diversity in
character; being not rarely absent, especially in the female
sex, or, on the other hand, amounting to four or even eight
in number. The horns, when numerous, arise from a crest
on the frontal bone, which is elevated in a peculiar manner.
Dr. L. Fitzinger, ‘ Ueber die vol. ii. p. 264.
Racen des Zahmen Schafes,’ 1860, s. ‘ Pfahlbauten,’ s. 127, 193.
86. Youatt on Sheep, p. 120.
” J. Anderson, ‘ Recreations in ‘ Journal of the Asiatic Soc. of
Agriculture and Natural History,’ Bengal,’ vol. xvi. pp. 1007, 1016.
Chap. Ill
THEIR VARIATION.
99
It is remarkable that multiplicity of horns “is generally
accompanied by great length and coarseness of the fleece.”
This correlation, however, is far from being general; for
instance, I am informed by Mr. D. Forbes, that the Spanish
sheep in Chile resemble, in fleece and in all other characters,
their parent merino-race, except that instead of a pair they
generally bear four horns. The existence of a pair of mammaa
is a generic character in the genus Ovis as well as in several
allied forms ; nevertheless, as Mr. Hodgson has remarked,
“ this character is not absolutely constant even among the
true and proper sheep : for I have more than once met with
Cagias (a sub- Himalayan domestic race) possessed of four
teats.” This case is the more remarkable as, when any
part or organ is present in reduced number in comparison
v/ith the same part in allied groups, it usually is subject to
little variation. The presence of interdigital pits has like-
wise been considered as a generic distinction in sheep ; but
Isidore Geoffrey®^ has shown that these pits or pouches are
absent in some breeds.
In sheep there is a strong tendency for characters, which
have apparently been acquired under domestication, to become
attached either exclusively to the male sex, or to be more
highly developed in this than in the other sex. Thus in
many breeds the horns are deficient in the ewe, though this
likewise occurs occasionally with the female of the wild
musmon. In the rams of the Wallachian breed, “ the horns
spring almost perpendicularly from the frontal bone, and
then take a beautiful spiral form ; in the ewes they protrude
nearly at right angles from the head, and then become twisted
in a singular manner.” Mr. Hodgson states that the ex-
traordinarily arched nose or chaffron, which is so highly
developed in several foreign breeds, is characteristic of the
ram alone, and apparently is the result of domestication.
I hear from Mr. Blyth that the accum ulation of fat in the
fat-tailed sheep of the plains of India is greater in the male
Youatt on ohcep, pp. 142-169.’ 435.
‘Journal Asiat. Soc. of Bengal, Youatt on Sheep, p, 138.
•■ol. xvi., 1847, p. 1015. ‘Journal Asiat. Soc. of Bengal,
*** ‘Hist. Nat. Gen., tom. iii. p. vol. xvi., 1847, pp. 1015, 1016.
100
SHEEP :
Chai- II]
than in the female ; and Fitzinger remarks that the mane
in the African maned race is far more developed in the ram
than in the ewe.
Diiferent races of sheep, like cattle, present constitutional
differences. Thus the improved breeds arrive at maturity at
an early age, as has been well shown by Mr. Simonds througli
their early average period of dentition. The several i-aces
have become adapted to different kinds of pasture and
climate : for instance, no one can rear Leicester sheep on
mountainous regions, where Cheviots flourish. As Youatt
has remarked, “ In all the different districts of Great Britain
we And various breeds of sheep beautifully adapted to the
locality which they occupy. No one knows their origin ;
they are indigenous to the soil, climate, pasturage, and the
locality on which they graze; they seem to have been formed
for it and by it.” Marshall relates that a flock of heavy
Lincolnshire and light Norfolk sheep which had been bred
together in a large sheep-walk, part of which was low, rich,
and moist, and another part high and dry, with benty grass,
when turned out, regularly separated from each other ; the
heavy sheep drawing off to the rich soil, and the lighter sheep
to their own soil ; so that “ whilst there was plenty of grass
the two breeds kept themselves as distinct as rooks and
pigeons.” Numerous sheep from various parts of the world
have been brought during a long course of years to the
Zoological Gardens of London ; but as Youatt» who attended
the animals as a veterinary surgeon, remarks, “ few or none
die of the rot, but they are phthisical ; not one of them from
a torrid climate lasts out the second year, and when they die
their lungs are tuberculated.” There is very good evidence
that English breeds of sheep will not succeed in France.^*^
Even in certain parts of England it has been found im-
‘ Racen des Zahmen Schafes,’ s.
77.
‘ Rural Economy of Norfolk,’ vol.
d. p. 136.
Youatt on Sheep, p. 312. On
same subject, see excellent remarks in
‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1858, p. 868.
For experiments in crossing Cheviot
sheep with Leicosters, see Youatt, p.
325.
Youatt on Sheep, note, p. 491.
** Ivl. Malingie-Nouel Journal R.
Agricult. Soc., vol. xiv. 1853, p. 214.
Translated and therefore approved by
a great authority, Mr. Pusey.
ClIAi>. III.
THEIR VARIATION.
10]
possible to keep certain breeds of sbeep ; thus on a farm on
the banks of the Ouse, the Leicester sheep were so rapidly-
destroyed by pleuritis that the owner could not keep them ;
the coarser-skinned sheep never being affected.
The period of gestation was formerly thought to be of sl-
unalterable a character, that a supposed difference of this kind
Ijetween the wolf and the dog was esteemed a sure sign of
specific distinction ; but we have seen that the period is
shorter in the improved breeds of the pig, and in the larger
breeds of the ox, than in other breeds of these two animals.
And now we know, on the excellent authority of Hermann
von Nathusius,^° that Merino and Southdown sheep, when
both have long been kept under exactly the same conditions,
differ in their average period of gestation, as is seen in the
following Table : —
Merinos 150-3 days.
Southdowns 144-2 „
Half-bred Merinos and Soutlido WHS .. 146-3 „
f blood of Southdown 145-5 „
i „ . 144-2 „
In this graduated difference in cross-bred animals having
different proportions of Southdown blood, we see how strictly
the two periods of gestation have been transmitted. Nathu-
sius remarks that, as Southdowns grow with remarkable
rapidity after birth, it is not surjDrising that their foetal
development should have been shortened. It is of course
possible that the difference in these two breeds may be due
to their descent from distinct parent-species ; but as the
early maturity of the Southdowns has long been carefully
attended to by breeders, the difference is more probably the
result of such attention. Lastly, the fecundity of the several
breeds differs much; some generally producing twins or even
triplets at a birth, of which fact the curious Shangai sheej)
(with their truncated and rudimentar}?- ears, and great Koniaii
noses), lately exhibited in the Zoological Gardens, offer a
remarkable instance.
Sheep are perhaps more readily affected by the direct action
™ ‘The Veterinary,’ vol. x. p. 217. given in ‘ Bull. Soc. Imp. d’Acclim.'^t,/
A. translation of his paper is tom. ix., 1862, d.
102
SHEEP:
Chap. III.
of the conditions of life to which they have been exposed than
almost any other domestic animal. According to Pallas, and
more recently according to Erman, the fat- tailed Kirghisian
slieep, when bred for a few generations in Eussia, degenerate,
and the mass of fat dwindles away, “ the scanty and bitter
herbage of the steppes seems so essential to their develop
ment.” Pallas makes an analogous statement with respect
to one of the Crimean breeds. Burnes states that the
Karakool breed, which produces a fine, curled, black, and
valuable fleece, when removed from its own canton near
Bokhara to Persia or to other quarters, loses its peculiar
fleece.^^ In all such cases, however, it may be that a change
of any kind in the conditions of life causes variability and
consequent loss of character, and not that certain conditions
are necessary for the development of certain characters.
G reat heat, however, seems to act directly on the fleece :
several accounts have been published of the change which
sheep imported from Europe undergo in the West Indies.
I)r. Ivicholson of Antigua informs me that, after the third
generation, the wool disappears from the whole body, except
over the loins ; and the animal then appears like a goat with
a dirty door mat on its back. A similar change is said to
take place on the west coast of Africa. On the other hand,
many wool-bearing sheep live on the hot plains of India.
Eoulin asserts that in the lower and heated valleys of the
Cordillera, if the lambs are sheared as soon as the wool has
grown to a certain thickness, all goes on afterwards as usual ;
but if not sheared, the wool detaches itself in flakes, and
short shining hair like that on a goat is produced ever
afterwards. This curious result seems merely to be an ex-
aggerated tendency natural to the Merino breed, for as a
*** Erman’s ‘Travels in Siberia’
(^Eng. trans.), vol. i. ]). 2‘28. Foi- Fallas
on the fat-tailed shet>]>, 1 quote from
Anderson’s account of the ‘ Sheep of
Russia,’ 1794, j). 34. With respect
to the Crimean sheep, ^ee Pallas’
‘Travels’ (Eng. trans.), vol. ii. p. 454.
For the Karakool sheep, see Burnes’
‘Travels in Bokhara,’ vol. iii. p. l.M.
See Report cf the Directors of
the Sierra Leone Company, as quoted
in White’s ‘Gradation of Man,’ p. 95.
With respect to the change which
sheep undergo in the West Judies, s-^e
also Dr. Davy, in ‘ Edin. New. Phil.
Journal,’ Jan. 1852. For the state-
ment made by Roulin, see ‘ Mem. d*'
I’lnstitut present, par divers Stivau.s.’
tom. vi., 1835, p. 347.
Chap. Ill
CAUSES OF VARIATION.
103
great autliority, namely, Lord Somerville, remarks, “the
wool of oui Merino sheep after shear- time is hard and coarse
to such a degree as to render it almost impossible to suppose
that the same animal could bear wool so opposite in quality,
compared to that which has been clipped from it : as the
cold weather advances, the fleeces recover their soft quality.’’
As in sheep of all breeds the fleece naturally consi^s-ol
longer and coarser hair covering shorter and softer wool, the
change which it often undergoes in hot climates is probably
merely a case of unequal development ; for even with those
sheep which like goats are covered with hair, a small quantity
of underlying wool may always be found. In the wild
mountain-sheep (Ovis montana) of North America there is an
analogous annual change of coat ; “ the wool begins to drop
out in earl}^ spring, leaving in its place a coat of hair resem-
bling that of the elk, a change of pelage quite different in
character from the ordinary thickening of the coat or hair,
common to all furred animals in winter, — for instance, in the
horse, the cow, &c., which shed their winter coat in the
spring.”
A slight difference in climate or j^asture sometimes slightly
affects the fleece, as has been observed even in different districts
in England, and is well shown by the great softness of the
wool brought from Southern Australia. But it should be
observed, as Youatt repeatedly insists, that the tendency to
change may generally be counteracted by careful selection.
M. Lasterye, after discussing this subject, sums up as
follows ; “ The preservation of the Merino race in its utmost
purity at the Cape of Good Hope, in the marshes of Holland,
and under the rigorous climate of Sweden, furnishes an ad
ditional support of this my unalterable principle, that fine*
vvuolled sheep may be kept wherever industrious men and
telligent breeders exist.”
That methodical selection has effected great changes in
Youatt on Sheep, p. 69, where tion counteracting any tendency to
Lord Somerville is quoted. See p. 117, change, see pp. 70, 117, 120, 168".
on the presence of wool under the Audubon and Bachman, ‘The
hair. With respect to the fleeces of Quadrupeds of North America,’ 184-6,
Australian shoep, p. 185. On selec* vdl. v. p. 365.
104
SHEEP:
Chap. III.
several breeds of sheep no one who knows anything on the
subject, entertains a doubt. The case of the Southdowns, as
improved by Ellman, offers perhaps the most striking in-
stance. Unconscious or occasional selection has likewise
slowly produced a great effect, as we shall see in the chapters
on Selection. That crossing has largely modified some breeds,
no one who will study what has been written on this subject
— for instance, Mr. Spooner’s paper — will dispute; but to
produce uniformity in a crossed breed, careful selection and
“ rigorous weeding,” as this author expresses it, are indis-
pensable.^^
In some few instances new breeds have suddenly originated ;
thus, in 1791, a ram-lamb was born in Massachusetts, having
short crooked legs and a long back, like a turnspit-dog. From
this one lamb the otter or ancon semi-monstrous breed was
x-aised ; as these sheep could not leap over the fences, it was
thought that they would be valuable ; but they have been
supplanted by merinos, and thus exterminated. The sheep
are remarkable from transmitting their character so truly
that Colonel Humphreys never heard of “ but one question-
able case” of an ancon ram and ewe not producing ancon
offspring. When they are crossed with other breeds the
offspring, with rare exceptions, instead of being intermediate
in character, perfectly resemble either parent; even one of
twins has resembled one parent and the second the other.
Lastly, “the ancons ha'^ been observed to keep together,
separating themselves f/om the rest of the flock when put
into enclosures with other sheep.”
A more interesting case has been recorded in the Report of
the Juries for the Great Exhibition (1851), namely, the pro-
iluction of a merino ram-lamb on the Mauchamp farm, in 1828,
which was remarkable for its long, smooth, straight, and. silky
wool. By the year 1833 M. Graux had raised rams enough to
serve his whole flock, and after a few more years he was able
to sell stock of his new breed. So peculiar and valuable is the
wool, that it sells at 25 per cent, above the best merino wool :
‘Journal of R. Agricult. Soc. of ‘Philosoph. Transactions,’ Loudon,
England,’ vol. xy , ^ .vt ii., VV. C. 1813, p. 88.
Spooner on cross-Breeding.
Chap. 111.
GOATS.
105
even the fleeces of half-bred animals are valuable, and are
knovm in France as the “ Manchamp-merino.” It is inter-
esting, as showing how generally any marked deviation of
structure is accompanied by other deviations, that the first
ram and his immediate offspring were of small size, witlj
large heads, long necks, narrow chests, and long flanks ; but
these blemishes were removed by judicious crosses and selec-
tion. The long smooth wool was also correlated with smooth
horns; and as horns and hair are homologous structures,
we can understand the meaning of this correlation. If the
Mauchamp and ancon breeds had originated a century or two
ago, we should have had no record of their birth ; and many
a naturalist would no doubt have insisted, especially in the
case of the Mauchamp race, that they had each descended
from, or been crossed with, some unknown aboriginal form.
Goats.
Fro]\i the recent researches of M. Brandt, most naturalists now
believe that all our goats are descended from the Capra cegagrus
of the mountains of Asia, possibly mingled with the allied
Indian species G. falconeri of India.^^ In Switzerland, during
tlie neolithic period, the domestic goat was commoner than the
slieep ; and this very ancient race differed in no respect from
that now common in Switzerland.^® At the present time, the
many races found in several parts of the world differ greatly
from each other ; nevertheless, as far as they have been tried,
tliey are all quite fertile when crossed. So numerous are the
bleeds, that Mr. G. Clark has described eight distinct kinds
imported into the one island of Mauritius. The ears of one
kind were enoi’mously developed, being, as measured by
Mr. Clark, no less than 19 inches in length and inches iu
breadth. As with cattle, the mammae of those breeds which
are regularly milked become greatly developed ; and, as
Isidore GeofFroy St. Hilaire,
"Hist. Nat. Generale,’ tom. iii. p. 87.
Mr. Blyth (‘Land and Water,’ 18H7,
p, 37) has arrived at a similar con-
clusion, but he thinks that certain
Eastern laces may perhaps be in part
descended From the Asiatic raarkhor.
Riitimeyer, ‘ Pfiihlbauten,’ .s. 127,
Godron, ‘ De I’Espfece,’ tom. i. p
402.
‘Annals and Mag. of Nat
History,’ vol. ii. (2nd series), 1848,
p. 363.
• IOC
GOATS.
Chai>. Ill
Mr. Clark remarks, “ it is not rare to see their teats touching
the ground.” The following cases are worth notice as pre-
senting unusual points of variation. According to Godron,^*^^
the niaminye differ greatly in shape in different breeds, being
elongated in the common goat, hemispherical in the Angora
race, and bilobed and divergent in the goats of Syria and
Nubia. According to this same author, the males of certain
breeds have lost their usual offensive odour. In one of the
Indian breeds the males and females have horns of widely-
different shapes ; and in some breeds the females are desti-
tute of horns.^®^ M.^Eamu of Nancy informs me that many
of the goats there bear on the upper part of the throat a pair
of hairy appendages, 70 mm. in length and about 10 mm.
in diameter, whieh in external appeai-ance resemble those
above described on the jaws of pigs. The presence of inter-
digital pits or glands on all four feet has been thought to
characterise the genus Ovis, and their absence to be charac-
teristic of the genus Capra ; but Mr. Hodgson has found that
they exist in the front feet of the majority of Himalayan
goats. Mr. Hodgson measured the intestines in two goats of
the Dugu race, and he found that the proportional length of the
great and small intestines differed considerably. In one of these
goats the caseum was thirteen inches, and in the other no less
than thirty-six inches in length !
101 ‘ De PEspeee,’ tom. i. p. 406.
Mr. Clark also refers to differences in
the shape of the mammae. Gordon
states that in the Nubian race the
scrotum is divided into two lobes ;
and Mr. Clark gives a ludicrous proof
of this fact, for he saw in the Mauri-
tius a male goat of the Muscat breed
purchased at a high price for a female
in full milk. These differences in
the scrotum are probably not due to
descent from distinct species: for
Mr. Clark states that this part varies
much in form.
102 Mr. Clark, ‘ Annals and Mag.
of Nat. Hist.,’ vol. ii. (2nd series),
1848, p. 361.
103 Hesinarest, ‘ Encyclop. Method.
Mammalogie,’ p. 480.
104 ‘ Journal of Asiatic Soc. of
Bengal,’ vol. xvi., 1847, pp. 1020,
1025.
Chap. IV.
RABBITS; THEIR PARENTAGE.
107
CHAPTER IV.
DOMESTIC RABBITS. — .
DO’VIESTIC BABBITS DESCENDED FROM THE COMMON WILD RABBIT — ANCIENT
DOMESTICATION ANCIENT SELECTION — LARGE LOP-EARED RABBITS —
VARIOUS BREEDS — FLUCTUATING CHARACTERS — ORIGIN OF THE HIMALAYAN
BREED — CURIOUS CASE OP INHERITANCE — ^FERAL RABBITS IN JAMAICA
AND THE FALKLAND ISLANDS — PORTO SANTO FERAL RABBITS — OSTEO-
LOGICAL CHARACTERS — SKULL — SKULL OP HALF-LOP RABBITS — VARIATIONS
IN THE SKULL ANALOGOUS TO DIFFERENCES IN DIFFERENT SPECIES OP
HARES — VERTEBRAE — STERNUM — SCAPULA — EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE
ON THE PROPORTIONS OP THE LIMBS AND BODY — CAPACITY OF THE
SKUDL AND REDUCED SIZE OF THE BRAIN — SUBIMARY ON THE MODIFICA-
TIONS OF DOMESTICATED RABBITS.
All naturalists, with, as far as I know, a single exception,
believe that the several domestic breeds of the rabbit are de-
scended from the common wild species ; I shall therefore
describe them more carefully than in the previous cases.
Professor Gervais ^ states “ that the true wild rabbit is smaller
than the domestic ; its proportions are not absolutely the
same ; its tail is smaller ; its ears are shorter and more
thickly clothed with hair ; and these characters, without
speaking of colour, are so many indications opposed to the
opinion which unites these animals under the same specific
denomination.” Few naturalists will agree with this author
that such slight differences are sufficient to separate as
distinct species the wild and domestic rabbit. How extra-
ordinary it would be, if close confinement, perfect tameness,
unnatural food, and careful bleeding, all prolonged during
many generations, had not produced at least some effect !
The tame rabbit has been domesticated from an ancient period.
Confucius ranges rabbits among animals worthy to be sacri-
ficed to the gods, and, as he - prescribes their multiplication,
they were probably at this early period domesticated in China.
They are mentioned by several of the classical writers. In
* M. P. Gervais, ‘Hist. Nat. des Mammi feres,’ 18.‘»4, tom. i., p. 288.
108
DOMESTIC RABBITS :
Chap. I V.
1631 Gcrvaiso Markham writes, “You shall not, as in other
cattell, looke to their shape, but to their richnesse, onely elect
your buckes, the largest and goodliest conies you can get ;
and for the richnesse of the skin, that is accounted the
richest which hath the equallest mixture of blacke and whit'^
haire together, yet the blacke rather shadowing the white ; tlie
t’urre should be thicke, deepe, smooth, and shining ;
they are of body much fatter and larger, and, when anothci
skin is worth two or three pence, they are worth two shillings.”
From this full description we see that silver-grey rabbits
existed in England at this period ; and -what is far more
important, we see that the breeding or selection of rabbits was
tlien carefully attended to. Aldrovandi, in 1637, describes,
on the authority of several old writers (as Scaliger, in 1557),
rabbits of various colours, some “ like a hare,” and he adds that
P. Valerianus (who died a very old man in 1558) saw at
Verona rabbits foru: times bigger than ours.^
From the fact of the rabbit having been domesticatc\l at an
ancient period, we must look to the northern hemisphere of the
Old World, and to the warmer temperate regions alone, for
the aboriginal parent-form ; for the rabbit cannot live without
protection in countries as cold as Sweden, and, though it has
run wild in the tro]3ical island of Jamaica, it has never greatly
multiplied there. It now exists, and has long existed, in the
warmer temperate parts of Europe, for fossil remains have been
found in several countries.^ The domestic rabbit readily
becomes feral in these same countries, and when variously
coloured kinds are turned out they generally revert to the
ordinary grey colour.^ Wild rabbits, if taken young, can be
domesticated, though the process is generally very trouble-
some.^ The various domestic races are often crossed, and are
2 U. Aldrovandi, ‘De Quadrupedi-
bus digitatis,’ 1637, p. 383. For Con-
fucius and G. Markham, see a writer
who has studied the subject, in
‘Cottage Gardener,’ Jan. 22nd, 1861,
p. 250.
3 Owen, ‘ British Fossil Mammals,’
p. 212.
4 Bechstein, ‘ Naturgesch. Dcutsch-
lands,’ 1801, b. i. p. 1133. I have re-
ceived similar accounts with respect
to England and Scotland.
6 ‘ Pigeons and Rabbits,’ by E. S.
Delamer, 1854, p. 133. Sir J. Se-
bright (‘ Observations on Instinct,’
1836, p. 10) speaks most strongly on
the difficulty. But this difficulty is
not invariable, as I have received two
Cha>. IV.
THEIR VARIATION.
109
believed to be quite fertile together, and a perfect gradation
can be shown to exist from the largest domestic kinds, having
enormously develoj)ed ears, to the common wild kind. The
parent-form must have been a burrowing animal, a habit not
comm.on, as far as I can discover, to any other species in the
large genus Lepus. Only one wild species is known with
certainty to exist in Europe ; but the rabbit (if it be a true
rabbit) from Mount Sinai, and likewise that from Algeria,'
present slight differences ; and these forms have been con-
sidered by some authors as specifically distinct.® But such
slight differences would aid us little in explaining the more
considerable differences characteristic of the several domestic
races. If the latter are the descendants of two or more closely
allied species, these, with the exception of the common rabbit,
have been exterminated in a wild state ; and this is very im-
probable, seeing with what pertinacity this animal holds its
ground. From these several reasons we may infer with
safety that ail the domestic breeds are the descendants of the
common wild species. But from what we hear of the mar-
vellous success in France in rearing hybrids between the
hare and rabbit,'' it is possible, though not probable, from the
great difficulty in making the first cross, that some of the
larger races, which are coloured like the hare, may have been
modified by crosses with this animal. Nevertheless, the chief
differences in the skeletons of the several domestic breeds
cannot, as we shall presently see, have been derived from a
cross with the hare.
There are many breeds which transmit their characters
more or less truly. Every one has seen the enormous lop-
eared rabbits exhibited at our shows ; various allied sub-
breeds are reared on the Continent, such as the so-called
Andalusian, which is said to have a large head with a round
forehead, and to attain a greater size than any other kind ;
another large Paris breed is named the Eouennais, and has a
accounts of perfect success in taming
and breeding from the wild rabbit.
iSee also Dr. P. Broca, in ‘ Journal de
la Physiologic,' torn. ii. p. 368.
® Gervais, ‘ Hist. Nat. des Marami-
feres,’ tom. i. p. 292.
’’ See Dr. P. Broca’s interesting
memoir on this subject in Brown-
Sequard’s ^ Journ. de Phys.,’ vol. ii.
p. 367.
no
DOMESTIC EADBITS:
Chap. IV
square head ; the so-called Patagonian rabbit has remarkably
short ears and a large round head. Although I have not seen
all these breeds, I feel some doubt about there being any marked
difference in the shape of their skulls.* English lop-eared
rabbits often weigh 8 lbs. or 10 lbs., and one has been ex-
hibited weighing 18 lbs. ; whereas a full-sized wild rabbit
weighs only about 3^ lbs. The head or skull in all the largo
lop-eared rabbits examined by me is much longer relativelj’
to its breadth than in the wild rabbit. Many of them have
loose transverse folds of skin or dewlaps beneath the throat,
which can be pulled out so as to reach nearly to the ends of
the jaws. Their ears are prodigiously developed, and hang
down on each side of their faces. A rabbit was exhibited in
1867 with its two ears, measured from the tip of one to the
tip of the other, 22 inches in length, and each ear 6| inches
in breadth. In 1869 one was exhibited with ears, measured
in the same manner, 23^- in length and 5;^ in breadth ; “ thus
exceeding any rabbit ever exhibited at a prize show.” In a
common wild rabbit I found that the length of two ears,
from tip to tip, was 7f inches, and the breadth only 1|^ inch.
The weight of body in the larger rabbits, and the development
of their ears, are the qualities which win prizes, and have
been carefully selected.
The hare-coloured, or, as it is sometimes called, the Belgian
rabbit, differs in nothing except colour from the other large
breeds ; but Mr. J. Young, of Southampton, a great breeder of
this kind, informs me that the females, in all the specimens
examined by him, had only six mammae ; and this certainly
was the case with two females which came into my pos-
session. Mr. B. P. Brent, however, assures me that the
number is variable with other domestic rabbits. The common
wild rabbit always has ten mammae. TJie Angora rabbit is
remarkable from the length and fineness of its fur, which
even on the soles of the feet is of considerable length. This
breed is the only one which differs in its mental qualities,
for it is said to be m nch more sociable than other rabbits, and
8 The skulls of these breeds are Horticulture,’ May 7th, 18G1, p. 108.
briefly described in the ‘ Journal of
CiiAr. I^.
THEIE VAEIATION.
Ill
the male shows no wish to destroy its yonng.^ Tvro live
rabbits were brought to me from Moscow, of about the size of
the wild species, but with long soft fur, different from that
of the Angora. These Moscow rabbits had pink eyes and
were snow-white, excepting the ears, two spots near the nose,
the upper and under surface of the tail, and the hinder tarsi,
which were blackish-brown. In short, they were coloured
nearly like the so-called Himalayan rabbits, presently to be
described, and differed from them only in the character of
their fur. There are two other breeds which come true to
colour, but differ in no other respect, namely silver-greys and
chinchillas. Lastly, the Nicard or Dutch rabbit may be
mentioned, which varies in colour, and is remarkable from
its small size, some specimens weighing only 1^ lb. ; rabbits
of this breed make excellent nurses for other and more
delicate kinds.^®
Certain characters are remarkably fluctuating, or are very
feebly transmitted by domestic rabbits : thus, one breeder
tells me that with the smaller kinds he has hardly ever
raised a whole litter of the same colour : with the large lop-
eared breeds “ it is impossible,” says a great judge,^^ “ to breed
true to colour, but by judicious crossing a great deal may be
done towards it. The fancier should know how his does are
bred, that is, the colour of their parents.” Nevertheless,
certain colours, as we shall presently see, are transmitted
truly. The dewlap is not strictly inherited. Lop-eared
rabbits, with their ears hanging down flat on each side of
the face, do not transmit this character at all truly. Mr.
Delamer remarks that, “ with fancy rabbits, when both the
parents are perfectly formed, have model ears, and are
handsomely marked, their progeny do not invariably turn
out the same.” When one parent, or even both, are oar-
laps, that is, have their ears sticking out at right angles,
or w'hen one parent or both are half-lops, that is, have only
® ‘Journal of Horticulture,^ 1861, p. 827. With respect to the ears, see
p. 380. Delamer on ‘ Pigeons and Eabbits,’
‘Journal of Horticulture,’ May 1854, p. 141; also ‘ Poultry Chroni-
28th, 1861, p. 169. cle,’ vol. ii. p. 499, and ditto for 1854;
‘ Journal of Horticulture,’ 1861, p. 586.
112
DOMESTIC IfABBITS :
Chap, IV.
one ear dependent, there is nearly as good a chance of the
progeny having both ears full-lop, as if both parents had
been thus characterized. But I am informed, if both parents
have upright ears, there is hardly a chance of a full-lop. In
some half- lops the ear that hangs down is broader and longer
than the upright ear;^^ so that we have the unusual case of
a want of symmetry on the two sides. This difference in the
position and size of the two ears probably indicates that the
lopping results from the great length and weight of the ear,
Fig 5.— Half-lop Rabbit. (Copied from E. S. Delamer’d work.)
favoured no doubt by the weakness of the muscles consequent
on disuse. Anderson mentions a bieed having only a
single ear ; and Professor Gervais another breed destitute of
ears.
We come now to the Himalayan breed, which is sometimes
called Chinese, Polish, or Eussian. These pretty rabbits are
white, or occasionally yellow, excepting their ears, nose,
feet, and the upper side of the tail, which are all brownish-
black ; but as they have red eyes, they may be considered as
Delamer, ‘ Pigeons and Rabbits, ‘An Account of the different
p. 136. See also ‘Journal of Horti- Kinds of Sheep in the Russian Domi-
culture,’ 1831, p. 375. nions,’ 1794, p. 39.
Chap. IY.
THE HIMALzVYAN BREED.
113
albinoes. I have received several accounts of their breeding
perfectly true. From their symmetrical marks, they were
at first ranked as specifically distinct, and were provisionally
named L. nigripes}"^ Some good observers thought that they
could detect a difference in their habits, and stoutly maintained
that they formed a new species. The origin of this breed is
so curious, both in itself and as throwing some light on the
complex laws of inheritance that it is worth giving in detail.
But it is first necessary briefly to describe two other breeds ;
silver-greys or silver-sprigs generally have black heads and
legs, and their fine grey fur is interspersed with numerous
black and white long hairs. They breed perfectly true, and
have long been kept in warrens. When they escape and
cross with common rabbits, the product, as I hear from Mr.
Wyrley Birch, of Wretham Hall, is not a mixture of the two
colours, but about half take after the one parent, and tho
other half after the other parent. Secondly, chinchillas or
tame silver-greys (I will use the former name) have short,
paler, mouse or slate-coloured fur, interspersed with long,
blackish, slate-coloured, and white hairs.^^ These rabbits
breed perfectly true. A writer stated in 1857^® that he had
produced Himalayan rabbits in the following manner. He
had a breed of chinchillas which had been crossed with the
common black rabbit, and their offspring were either blacks
or chinchillas. These latter were again crossed with other
chinchillas (which had also been crossed with silver-greys),
and from this complicated cross Himalayan rabbits were
raised. From these and other similar statements, Mr.
Bartlett was led to make a careful trial in the Zoological
Gardens, and he found that by simply crossing silver-greys
with chinchillas he could always produce some few Hima-
la}^ans ; and the latter, notwithstanding their sudden origin,
if kept separate, bred perfectly true. But I have recently
been assured the pure silver-greys of any sub-breed occasion
ally produce Himalayans.
‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ June 23rd., ‘ Cottage Gardener,’ 1857, p. 141
1857, p. 159. Mr. Bartlett, in ‘Proc. Zoolog
‘Journal of Horticulture,’ April Soc.’ 1861, p. 40.
^th, 1861, p. 35.
9
Ill
DOMESTIC EABBTTS :
Chaf IV,
U’he Himalayans, when first born, are quite white, and are
then true albinoes ; but in the course of a few months they
gradually assume their dark ears, nose, feet, and tail. Occ\-
sionally, however, as I am informed by Mr. W. A. Wooler
and the Eev. W. D. Fox, the young are born of a very pale
gre}^ colour, and specimens of such fur were sen! me by the
former gentleman. The grey tint, however, disappears as
the animal comes to maturity. So that with these liima-
layaiis there is a tendency, strictly confined to earl}^ youth,
to revert to the colour of the adult silver-grey parent-stock.
Silver-greys and cliincliillas, on the other hand, present a re-
markable contrast with the Himalayans in their colour whilst
quite young, for they are born perfectly black, but soon assume
their characteristic grey or silver tints. The same thing occurs
with gre}" horses, which, as long as they are foals are generally
of a nearly black colour, but soon become grey, and get whiter
and whiter as they grow older. Hence the usual rule is that
Himalayans are born white and afterwards become in certain
parts of their bodies dark-coloured • whilst silver-greys are
born black and afterwards become sprinkled with white.
Exceptions, however, and of a directly opposite nature,
occasionally occur in both cases. For young silver-greys
are sometimes born in warrens, as I hear from Mr. W. Birch,
of a cream- col our, but these young animals ultimately become
black. The Himalayans, on the other hand, sometimes produce,
as is stated by an experienced amateur,^* a single black young
one in a litter ; and this, before two months elapse, becomes
perfectly white.
To sum up the whole curious case : wild silver-grej^s may
be considered as black rabbits which become grey at an early
period of life. When they are crossed with common rabbits,
the offspring are said not to have blended colours, but to take
after either parent ; and in this respect they resemble black
and albino vaiueties of most quadrupeds, which often transmit
their colours in this same manner. When they are crossed
with chinchillas, that is, with a paler sub-variety, the young
are at first pure albinoes, but soon become dark-coloured in
** ‘Phenomenon in Himalayan Rabbits,’ in ‘Journal of Horticulture,’ Jmu
27th, IHtio, p. 102
Chat. IV.
THE HIMALAYAN BKEED.
115
certain parts of tlieir "bodies, and are tlien called Himalayans.
The young Himalayans, however, are sometimes at first
either pale grey or com|)letely black, in either case changing
after a time to white. In a future chapter I shall advance
a large body of facts showing that, when two varieties are
crossed both of which differ in colour from their parent-stock,
there is a strong tendency in the young to T*evert to' the
aboriginal colour ; and what' is very remarkable, this reversion
.occasionally supervenes, not before birth, but during the
growth of the animal. Hence, if it could be shown that
silver-greys and chinchillas were the offspring of a cross
between a black and albino variety with the colours intimately
blended — a supposition in itself not improbable, and supported
by the circumstance of silver-greys in warrens sometimes pro-
ducing creamy- white young, which ultimately become black —
then all the above given paradoxical facts on the changes of
colour in silver-greys and in their descendants the Himalayans
V ould come under the law of reversion, supervening at dif-
ferent periods of growth and in diff'erent degrees, either to tlie
original black or to the original albino parent- variety.
It is, also, remarkable that Himalayans, though produced
so suddenly, breed true. But as, whilst young, they are
albinoes, the case falls under a very general rule; albinism
being well known to be strongly inheiited, for instance with
white mice and many other quadrupeds, and even white
flowers. But why, it may be asked, do the ears, tail, nose,
and feet, and no other part of the body, revert to a black
colour ? This apparently depends on a law, which generally
holds good, namely, that characters common to many species
of a genus — and this, in fact, implies long inheritance from
the ancient progenitor of the genus — are found to resist
variation, or to reappear if lost, more persistently than the
characters which are confined to the separate species. Now,
in the genus Lepus, a large majority of the species have their
ears and the upper surface of the tail tinted black ; but the
persistence of these marks is best seen in those species which
in winter become white : thus, in Scotland the L. variahilis
G. IL W'al^rhvyase, ‘ Natural History of IMammalia : Rodents/ 18 t6, pp. 52j
60, too.
U6
DOMESTIC RABBITS.
ClIAl' IV.
in its winter dress has a shade of colour on its nose, and the
tips of its ears are black : in the L. tibetanus the ears are
black, the upper surface of the tail greyish-black, and the
soles (‘f the feet brown : in L. glacialis the winter fur is pure
white, except the soles of the feet and the points of the ears.
Even in the variously- coloured fancy rabbits we may often
observe a tendency in tliese same parts to be more darkly
tinted than the rest of the body. Thus the several coloured
marks on the Himalayan rabbits, as they grow old, are
rendered intelligible. I may add a nearly analogous case :
fancy rabbits very often have a white star on their foreheads ;
and the common English hare, whilst young, generally has,
as I have myself observed, a similar white star on its
forehead.
When variously coloured rabbits are set free in Europe, and
are thus placed under their natural conditions, they generall}”
revert to the aboriginal grey colour ; this may be in part due
to the tendency in all crossed animals, as lately observed, to
revert to their primordial state. But this tendency does not
always prevail ; thus silver-grey rabbits are kept in warrens,
and remain true though living almost in a state of nature ;
but a warren must not be stocked with both silver-greys and
common rabbits ; otherwise “ in a few years there will be
none but common greys surviving.”^® When rabbits run
wild in foreign countries under new conditions of life, they
by no means always revert to their aboriginal colour. In
Jamaica the feral rabbits are described as having been “ slate-
coloured, deeply tinted with sprinklings of white on the neck,
on the shoulders, and on the back; softening oif to blue- white
under the breast and belly.” But in this tropical island
the conditions were not favourable to their increase, and they
never spread widely, and are now extinct, as I hear from ]\Ir.
It. Hill, owing to a great fire which occurred in the woods.
Babbits during many years have run wild in the Falkland
Delamer oa ‘Pigeons and Rabbits,’ have become feral in a hot country,
p. 1 14. They can be kept, however, at Loanda
Gosse’s ‘Sojourn in Jamaica,’ (see Livingstone’s ‘Travels,’ p. 407).
1851, p. 441, as described by an ex- In parts of India, as I am informed bj
cellent observer, l\Ir. R. Hill. This is Mr. Blyth, they breed ’rteii.
the only known case in which rabbitii
CiiAi . rv.
FERAL RABBITS.
117
Islands ; they are abundant in certain parts, but do not
spread extensively. Most of them are of the common grey
colour ; a few, as I am informed by Admiral Sulivan, are
hare-coloured, and many are black, often with nearly symme-
trical white marks on their faces. Hence, M. Lesson described
the black variety as a distinct species, under the name
Lepus magcUanicus, but this, as I have elsewhere shown, is an
error.^^ Within recent times the sealers have stocked some
of the small outlying islets in the Falkland group with
rabbits ; and on Pebble Islet, as I hear from Admiral Sulivan,
a large proportion are hare-coloured, whereas on Eabbit Islet
a large proportion are of a bluish colour, which is not else-
where seen. Hov/ the rabbits were coloured which were
turned out of these islets is not known.
The rabbits which have become feral on the islaiid of Porto
Santo, near Madeira, deserve a fuller account. In 1418 or
1419, J. Gonzales Zarco^^ happened to have a female rabbit
on board which had produced young during the voyage, and
he toned them all out on the island. These animals soon
increased so rapidly, that they became a nuisance, and actu-
ally caused the abandonment of the settlement. Thirty-
seven years subsecpiently, Cada Mosto describes them as
innumerable ; nor is this supjising, as the island was not
inhabited by any beast of prey or by any teiTestrial mammal.
A\'e do not know the character of the mother-rabbit ; but it
^^'as probably the common domesticated kind. lire Spanish
peninsula, whence Zarco sailed, is known to have abounded
with the common wild species at the most remote historical
] eriod ; and as these rabbits were taken on board for food, it
is improbable that they should have been of any peculiar
breed. That the breed was well domesticated is shown by
the doe having littered during the voyage. Mr. Wollastoii,
at my request, brought home two of these feral rabbits in
spirits of wine; and, subsequently, Mr. W. Hayw^ood sent to
l>ar\vin’s ‘ Jo’jrn;>] of Researches,-’ Lisbon in 1717, entitled ‘ llihtdi'ia
I>. 19.‘’> ; and ‘ Zoology of the Voyage liisulana,’ written by a Jesuit, the
of the Beagle: Maimnalia,’ }). 92. rabbits were turned out In 14-20. Some
33 Kerr’s ‘ Collection of Voyages,’ luthors believe that the island wat
vol. ii. [>. 177 : p. 2or> fur Ca^a Mosto. discovered in 1413.
A.xordiug ..to a .work published in
118
DOMESTIC RABBITS.
ClIAP. IV.
me three more specimens in brine, and two alive. These
seven specimens, though caught at different periods, closely
resembled each other. They were full grown, as shown by
the state of their bones. Although the conditions of life in
Torto Santo are evidently highly favourable to rabbits, as
proved by their extraordinarily rapid increase, yet they differ
conspicuously in their small size from the wild English
rabbit. Four English rabbits, measured from the incisors to
the anus, varied between 17 and 17| inches in length; whilst
two of the Porto Santo rabbits were only 14^ and 15 inches
in length. But the decrease in size is best shown by weight ;
four wild English rabbits averaged 3 lb. 5 oz., whilst one of
the Porto Santo rabbits, which had lived for four years in the
/-oological Hardens, but had become thin, weighed only 1 lb.
9 oz. A fairer test is afforded by the comparison of the well-
cleaued limb-bones of a Porto Santo rabbit hilled on the island
with the same bones of a wild English rabbit of average size,
and they differed in the proportion of rather less than fi ve to
nine. So that the Porto Santo rabbits have decreased nearly
three inches in length, and almost half in weight of body.'-^^
The head has not decreased in length proportionally with the
body ; and the capacity of the brain case is, as w^e shall
hereafter see, singularly variable. I prepared four skulls,
and these resembled each other more closelj^ than do generally
the skulls of wild English rabbits ; but the only difference in
structure which they presented was that the supra-orbital
processes of the frontal bones were narrower.
In colour the Porto Santo rabbit differs considerably from
the common rabbit ; the up23er surface is redder, and is rarely
interspersed with any black or black- tipped hairs. The
throat and certain parts of the under surface, instead of being
pure white, are generally pale grey or leaden colour. But
the most remarkable difference is in the ears and tail ; I have
examined many fresh English rabbits, and the large collection
Something of the same kia I has coniiti-yman tui-ued out some rabbits
uccarred on the island of Lipari. which multiplied prodigiously, but,
where, according to Spallanzani says Spallanzjini, “ les lapins do I’ilo
P Voyage dans les deux Siciles,’ quoted de Lipari sont plus petits que ceui
by Godrou, ‘ De I’Espece,’ p. 3(54), a qu’on eleve en doinestioite.”
Chap. IV
FERAL RABBITS.
119
of skins in the British Museum from various countries, and
all have the upper surface of the tail and the tips of the ears
clothed with blackish-grey fur; and this is given in most
works as one of the specific characters of the rabbit. Now
in the seven Porto Santo rabbits the upper surface of the
tail was reddish-brown, and the tips of the ears had no trace
of the black edging. But here we meet with a singular
circumstance : in June, 1861, 1 examined two of these rabbits
recently sent to the Zoological Gardens, and their tails and
ears were coloured as just described; but when one of their
dead bodies was sent to me in Februaiy, 1865, the ears were
plainly edged, and the upper surface of the tail was covered
with blackish-grey fur, and the whole body was much less
red ; so that under the English climate this individual rabbit
liad recovered the proper colour of its fur in rather less than
four years !
The two little Porto Santo rabbits, whilst alive in the Zoo-
logical Gardens, had a remarkably different appearance from
the common kind. They were extraordinarily wild and active,
so that many persons exclaimed on seeing them that they were
more like large rats than rabbits. They were nocturnal to
an unusual degree in their habits, and their wildness was never
in the least subdued ; so that the superintendent, Mr. Bartlett,
assured me that he had never had a wilder animal under his
charge. This is a singular fact, considering that they are de-
scended from a domesticated breed. I was so ihuch surprised at
it, that I requested Mr. Haywood to make inquiries on the spot,
wliether they were much hunted by the inhabitants, or per-
secuted by hawks, or cats, or other animals ; but this is not
tlie case, and no cause can be assigned for their wildness.
Tb.ey live both on the central, higher rocky land and neai
the sea-cliffs, and, from being exceedingly shy and timid,
seldom appear in the lower and cultivated districts. They
are said to produce from four to six young at a birth, and
their breeding season is- in July and August. Lastly, aiid
this is a highly remarkable fact, Mr. Bartlett could never
succeed in getting these two rabbits, which were both males,
to associate or breed with the females of several breeds which
wore repeatedly placed w'tli tliem,
120
DOMESTIC RABBITS :
Chai'. IV.
If the histor}^ of these Porto Santo rabbits had not beer
known, most naturalists, on observing their much reduced
size, their colour, reddish above and grey beneath, their taiU
and ears not tipped with black, would have ranked them as a
distinct species. They would have been strongly confirmtd
in this view by seeing them alive in the Zoological Gardens,
and hearing that they refused to couple with other rabbits.
Yet this rabbit, which there can be little doubt would thus
have been ranked as a distinct species, as certainly originated
since the year 1420. Finally, from the three cases of the
rabbits which have run wild in I’orto Santo, Jamaica, and
the Falkland Islands, we see that these animals do not, under
new conditions of life, revert to or retain their aboriginal cha-
racter, as is so generally asserted to be the case by most
authors.
Osteologicat Characters.
When we remember, on the one hand, how frequently it is
stated that important parts of the structure never vary ; and,
on the other hand, on what small differences in the skeleton
fossil species have often been founded, the variability of the
skull and of some other bones in the domesticated rabbit well
deserves attention. It must not be supposed that the more
important differences immediately to be described strictly
characterise any one breed ; all that can be said is, that they
are generally present in certain breeds. We should bear in
mind that selection has not been applied to fix any character
in the skeleton, and that the animals have not had to support
themselves under uniform habits of life. We cannot account
for most of the differences in the skeleton ; but we shall see
that the increased size of the body, due to careful nurture and
continued selection, has affected the head in a particular
manner. Even the elongation and lopping of the ears have
influenced in a small degree the form of the whole skull.
The want of exercise has apparently modified the propor-
tional length of the limbs in comparison with that of the
body.
As a standard of comparison, 1 ])repared f-kelotons of two wild
rabbits from Kent, one from the. Slietland islands, and one from
Chai-. iV. DIFFERENCES IN THEIR SKELETONS.
121
A.ntrim in Ireland. As all the bones in these four specimens from
such distant localities closely resembled each other, presenting
scarcely any appreciable difference, it may be concluded that the
bones of the wild rabbit are generally uniform in character.
Skull. — I have carefully examined skulls of ten lai'ge lop-eared
rabbits, and of five common domestic rabbits, which latter differ from
the lop-eared only in not having such large bodies or ears, yet both
larger than in the wild rabbit. First for the ten lop-eared rabbits :
in all these the skull is remarkably elongated in comparison with
its breadth. In a wild rabbit the length was 8'15 inches, in a large
fancy rabbit, 4-3 ; whilst the breadth of the cranium enclosing the
brain was in both almost exactly the same. Even by taking as the
standard of comparison the widest part of the zygomatic arch, the
skulls of the lop-eared are proportionally to the.r breadth three-
quarters of an inch too long. The depth of the head has increased
almost in the same proportion with the length ; it is the breadth
alone which has not increased. The parietal and occipital bones
enclosing the brain are less arched, both in a longitudinal and
transverse line, than in the wild rabbit, so that the shape of the
cranium is somewhat different. The surface is rougher, less cleanly
sculptured, and the lines of sutures are more prominent.
Although the skulls of the large lop-eared rabbits Jii comparison
with those of the wild rabbit are much elongated relatively to their
breadth, j'^et, relatively to the size of body, they are far from elon-
gated. The lop-eared rabbits which I examined were, though not
fat, more than twice as heavy as the wild specimens; but the skull
was very far fi-om being twice as long. Even if we take the fairer
standai’il of the length of body, from the nose to the anus, the skull
is not on an average as long as it ought to be by a third of an inch.
In the small feral Porto Santo rabbit, on the other hand, the head
relatively to the length of body is about a quarter of an inch too
long.
This elongation of the skull relatively to its breadth, I find a
universal character, not only with the large lop-eared rabbits, but
in all the artificial breeds; as is well seen in the skull of the Angora.
1 was at first much surprised at the fact, and could not imagine why
domestication could produce this uniform result; but the explana-
tion seems to lie in the circumstance that during a number of gene-
rations the artificial races have been closely confined, and have had
little occasion to exert cither their senses, or intellect, or voluntary
muscles; consequently the brain, as we shall presently more fully
see, has not increased relatively with the size of body. As the brain
has not increased, the bony case enclosing it has not increased, and
this has evidently affected through correlation the breadth of the
entire skull from end to end. .
In all the skulls of the large lop-eared rabbits, the supra-orbital
plates or processes of the frontal bones are much broader than in
the wild rabbit, and they generally project more upwards. In the
zygomatic arch the posterior or projecting point of the malar-bone
122
DOMESTIC EABBITS:
CHAr. IV.
is broader and blunter; and in the specimen, fig. 8, it is so in a
remarkable degree. This point approaches nearer to the auditory
meatus than in the wild rabbit, as may be best seen in fig. 8; but
this circumstance mainly depends on the changed direction of the
meatus. The inter-parietal bone (see fig. 9) differs much in shape
in the several skulls; generally it is more oval, that is more ex-
tended in the line of the longitudinal axis of the skull, than in the
wild rabbit. The posterior margin of the square raised plat-
Char IV.
DIFFEEENCES IN THEIR SKELETONS.
123
fcrm”^® of the occiput, instead of being truncated, or projecting slightly
as in the wild rabbit, is in most
lop-cared rabbits pointed, as in
tig. 9, C. The parainastoids rela-
tively to the size of tlie skull are
generally much thicker than in
the wild rabbit.
The occipital foramen (fig. 10)
presents some remarkable differ-
ences: in the wild rabbit, the
lower edge between the condyles
is considerably and almost angu-
larly hollowed out, and the upper
edge is deeply and squarely
notched; hence the longitudinal
axis exceeds the transverse axis.
In the skulls of the lop-eared
rabbits the transverse axis ex-
ceeds the longitudinal ; for in
none of these skulls was the
lower edge between the condyles
so deeply hollowed out ; in five
of them there was no upper
square notch, in three there was a trace of the notch
alone it was well developed.
These differences in the
shape of the foramen are
remarkable, considering
that it gives passage to so
important a structure as
the spinal marrow, though
apparently the outline of
the latter is not affected
by the shape of the passage.
In all the skulls of the
large lop-eared rabbits, the
Fig 8.— Part of Zygomatic Arcli, showing the
projecting end of the malar hi ne of the
auditory meatus: of natural size. Upper
figure, Wild Rabbit, l.ower figure, Lop-
eared, hare coloured Rabbit.
and in two
Fig, 9. — Posterior end of skull, of natufal size, showing
ihe inter-parietal bone. A. Wild Rabbit. B. Feral
Rabbit from island of P. Santo, near Madeira.
C. Large Lop-eared Rabbit.
bony auditory meatus is conspicuously larger than in the wild
rabhit. Ina skull 4’3 inches a p.
in length, and which barely
exceeded in breadth the
skull of a wild rabbit
(which was 3T5 inches in
length), the longer diameter
of ihe meatus was exactly
twice as great. The orifice Fig. lo.-Occipitai F. ramen. o'' namral size, in —
is more , compressed, and a. wild Rabbit; B. Lai ge Lop-eared Rabbit.
its margin on the side nearest the skull stands up higher than
Waterhouse, ‘Nat. Hist. Mammalia,’ vol. ii. p. 36.
.124
DOMESTIC RABBITS:
CllAl', IV.
the outer side. The whole meatus is directed more forMaids.
As in breeding lop-eared rabbits the length of the eais and
their consequent lopping and lying flat on the face, are the
chief points of excellence, tijere can hardly be a doubt that the
great change in the size,
form, and direction of the
bony meatus, ] datively to
this same part in the wild
rabbit, is due to the con-
tinued selection of indi-
viduals having larger and
larger ears. The influence
of the external ear on the
bony meatus is well shown
in the skulls (I have ex-
amined three) of half-lops
(see fig. 5), in which one ear
stands upright, and the other
and longer ear hangs down;
for in these skulls there was
a plain ditference in the
form and direction of the
bony meatus on the two
sides. But it is a much
more interesting fact, that
the changed diiection and
increased size of the bony
meatus have slightly affected
on the same side the struc-
ture of the whole skull. I
here give a drawing (fig. 11)
of the skull of a half-lop ; and
it may be observed that the
suture between the parietal
and frontal bones does not
run strictly at right angles
to the longitudinal axis of
the skull, the left frontal
bone projects beyond lie
right one; boththeposterioi*
Fig. 11.— Skull, of naluralsizp, of Half-lop nabhit, j QTitpHov morPius of the
showing the different dirertion of the auditory anieilOl maiglES OI inc
meatus on th^ two sMes, and the consequint left ZygOmatic ai’Ch OH the
general d-s'or.lon of the skull Tne left ear of lopping ear Stand
the iuiitiial (or right side of figure) lopped t j i
torwurds. • ® ^ a little m advance of tlic
corrosjionding bones on the
opposite side Even the lower jaw is affected, and the condylts aie
not quite symmetrical, that on the left standing a little in advanee
of that on the right. This seems to me a remarkable case of
coi relation of growth. Who would have surmised that by keeping
Chap. IV.
DIFFERENCES IN THEIR SKELETONS.
125
an animal during many generations under confinement, and so
leading to the disuse of the muscles of the ears, and by continually
selecting individuals with the longest and largest ears, he would
thus indirectly' have affected almost every suture in the skull and
the form of the lower jaw !
In the large lop-eared rabbits the only difference in the lower
jaw, in comparison with that of the wild rabbit, is that the posterior
margin of the ascending ramus is broader and more inflected. The
teeth in neither jaw present any difference, except that the small
incisors, beneath the large ones, are proportionately a little longer.
The molar teeth have increased in size proportionately with the
increased width of the skull, measured across the zygomatic arch,
and not proportionally with its increased length. The inner line of
the sockets of the molar teeth in the upper jaw of the wild rabbit
forms a perfectly straight line; but in jorne of the largest skulls of
the lop-eared this line was plainly bowed inwards. In one specimen
there was an additional molar tooth on each side of the upper jaw,
between the molars and premolars ; but these two teeth did not
C(urespond in size ; and as no rodent has seven molars, this is
merely a monstrosity, though a curious one.
The five other skulls of common domestic rabbits, some of which
approach in size the above-described largest skulls, whilst the
others exceed but little those of the wild rabbit, are only worth
notice as presenting a perfect gradation in all the above-specified
differences between the skulls of the largest lop-eared and wild
rabbits. In all, however, the supra-orbital plates are rather larger,
and in all the auditory meatus is larger, in conformity with the
increased size of the external ears, than in the wild rabbit. The
lower notch in the occipital foramen in some was not so deep as in
the wild rabbit, but in all five skulls the upper notch was well
developed.
The skull of the Jw (/ora rabbit, like the latter five skulls, is inter-
mediate in general proportions, and in most other characters, between
those of the largest lop-eared and wild rabbits. It presents only
one singular character : though considerably longer than the skull
of the wild rabbit, the breadth measured within the posterior supra-
orbital fissures is nearly a third less than in the wild. The skull-;
of the silver-grey, and chinchilla and Himalayan rabbits are more
elongated than in the wild, with broader supra-orbital plates, but
differ little in any other respect, excepting that the upper and lower
notches of the occipital foramen are not so deep or so well developed
'1 he skull of the Moscow rabbit scarcely differs at all from that of the
wild rabbit. In the Porto Santo feral rabbits the supra-orbital plates
are generally narrower and more pointed than in our wild rabbits.
As some of the largest lop-eared rabbits of which I prepared
skeletons were coloured almost like hares, and as these latter animals
and rabbits have, as it is affirmed, been recently crossed in Prance,
it might be thought that some of the above-described characters
had been derived from a cross at a remote period with the hare.
126
DOMESTIC RABBITS:
Chap, IY-
Consequently I examined skulls of the hare, but no light could thus
be thrown on the peculiarities of the skulls of the larger rabbits.
It is, however, an interesting fact, as illustrating the law that
varieties of one species often assume the characters of other species
of the same genus, that I found, on comparing the skulls of ten
species of hares in Die British Museum, that they differed from each
other chiefly in the very same points in which domestic rabbits
vary, — namely, in general proportions, in the fortn and size of the
subra-orbital plates, in the form of the free end of the malar bone,
and in the line of suture separating the occipital and frontal bones.
Moreover two eminently variable characters in the domestic rabbit,
namely, the outline of the occipital foramen and the shape of the
raised platform ’’ of the occiput, were likewise variable in two
instances in the same species of hare.
Vertebrex. — The number is uniform in all the skeletons which I
have examined, with two exceptions, namely, in one of the small
feral Porto Santo rabbits and in one of the largest lop-eared kinds;
both of these had as usual seven cervical, twelve dorsal with ribs,
but, instead of seven lumbar, both had eight lumbar vertebrae.
This is remarkable, as Gervais gives seven as the number for the
whole genus Lepus. The caudal vertebrae apparently differ by
two or three, but I did not attend to them, and they are ditflcult to
count with certainty.
In the first cervical v^ertebra, or atlas, the anterior margin of the
neural arch varies a little in wild specimens, being either nearly
smooth, or furnished with a small supra-median atlantoid process;
I have figured a specimen with the
largest proce.ss {a) which I have seen ;
but it will be observed how inferior
this is in size and different in shape
to that in a large lop-eared rabbit.
In the latter, the infra-median pro-
cess (6) is also proportionally much
thicker and longer. The aim are a
little squarer in outline. '
Third cervical v'^riebra. — In the
wild rabbit (fig. 18, a a) this ver-
tebra, viewed on the inferior surface,
has a transverse process, which is
directed obliquely backwards, and
consists of a single pointed bar ; in
the fourth vertebra this process is
slightly forked in the middle. In the
Fitr. 12.— Atlas Vertebra, of naturni size; large lop-eared rabbits this pi’ocess
Upper figure. Wild Rabbit. I .ower (b « ) IS forked m the third vertebra,
figure. Hare coloured, large, Lop-cared aS in the fourth of the wild rabbit.
But the third cervical vertebrae of
the wild and lop-eared (a b, b b)
rabbits differ more conspicuously when their anterior articular
Rabbit, a, snpra-median, atlantoid
process ; b, infra-median process.
Chap. IV,
DIFFERENCES IN THEIR SKELETONS.
127
surfaces are compared ; for the extremities of the antero-dorsal pro-
cesses in the wild nibbit are simply rounded, whilst in the lop-eared
they are trifid, with a deep
central pit. The canal
for the spinal marrow in
the lop-eared (b 6) is more
elongated in a transverse
direction than in the wild
rabbit; and the passages
for the arteries are of a
slightly different shape.
Th^ese several differences
in this vertebra seem to
me well deserving atten-
tion.
First dorsal vertebra. —
Its neural spine varies in
length in the wild rabbit ;
being sometimes very
short, but generally more
than half as long as that
of the second dorsal; but I have seen it in two large lop-eared
rabbits three-fourths of the length of that of the second dorsal
vertebra.
Ninth and tenth dorsrd vertebrm. — In the wild rabbit the neural
spine of the ninth vertebra is just perceptibly thicker than that of
the eighth ; and the neural spine of the tenth is plainly thicker and
shorter than those of all the anterior vertebrae. In the large lop-
eared rabbits the neural spines of the tenth, ninth, and eighth vertebrae,
and even in a slight degree that of the seventh, are very much
thicker, and of somewhat different shape, in comparison with those
of the wild rabbit. So that this part of the vertebral column differs
considerably in appearance from the same part in the wild rabbit,
and closely resembles in an interesting manner these same vertebrae
in some species of hares. In the Angora, Chinchilla, and Hima-
layan rabbits, the neural spines of the eighth and ninth vertebrae
are in a slight degree thicker than in the wild. On the other hand,
in one of the feral Porto Santo rabbits, which in most .of its cha-
racters deviates from the common wild rabbit, in a direction
exactly opposite to that assumed by the large lop-eared rabbits, the
neural spines of the ninth and tenth vertebrae were not at all larger
than those of the several anterior vertebrae. In this same Porto
Santo specimen there was no trace in the ninth vertebra of the
anterior lateral processes (see woodcut 14), which are plainly deve-
loped in all British wild rabbits, and still more plainly developed
in the large lop-eared rabbits. In a ’half-wild rabbit from Sandon
Park,-® a haemal spine was moderately well developed on the under
A B
F p;. 13.— Third Cervical Vertebra?, of natural size,
of — A. Wild Rabbit; B. Hare-coloured, large,
Lop-eared Babbit, a, a, interior surface; b, b,
anterior articular surfaces.
These rabbits have run wild for and in other places in Staffordshire
a considerable time in Sandon Park, and Shropshire. They originated, as
128
DOMESTIC rabbits:
Chap IV.
side of the twelfth dorsal vertebra, and I have seen this in no other
specimen.
Vig. 14. — Dorsal Vertebrae, from sixth to tenth inclusive, of natural size, viewed laterally.
A. Wild Rabbit. B. Large, Hare-coloun d, so called Spanish Rabbit.
Lumbar Vertebrce. — I have stated that in two cases there were
eight instead of seven lumbar vertebrae. The
third lumbar vertebrae in one skeleton of a
wild British rabbit, and in one of the Porto
Santo feral rabbits, had a haemal spine ;
whilst in four skeletons of large lop-eared
rabbits, and in the Himalayan rabbit, this
same vertebra had a well developed haemal
spine.
Felvis. — In four wild specimens this bone
was almost absolutely identical in shape ; but
in several domesticated breeds shades of
differences could be distinguished. In the
large lop-eared rabbits, the whole upper part
of the ilium is straighter, or less splayed out-
wards, than in the wild rabbit; and the
tuberosity on the inner lip oF the anterior
and upper part of the ilium is proportional iy
more prominent.
Sternum. — The posterior end of the pos-
terior sternal bone in the wild rabbit (fig. 15,
a) is thin and slightly enlarged ; in some of
the large lop-eared rabbits (b) it is much more enlarged towards
ABC
Fig. 15. — Terminal hone of
Sternum, of natural size.
A. Wild Rabbit. B. Hiire-
coloured,Lop-earf d llabbit.
C. Hare-coloured Spanish
Rabbit. (N.B, The left-
hand angle of the upper
articular extremity of B
rvns broken, and has been
accidentally thus repre-
sented.)
I have been informed by the game-
keeper, from variously-coloured do-
mestic rabbits which had been turned
cut. They vary in colour ; but
many are symmetrically coloured.
being white with a streak along the
spine, and with the ears and certain
marks about th’e head of a blackish-
grey tint. They have rather longer
bodies than common rabbits.
Chat. IV,
DIFFERENCES IN THEIR SKELETONS.
129
tlie extremity; whilst in other specimens (c) it keeps nearly of
the same breadth from end to end, but is much thicker at the
extremity.
Scapula. — The acromion sends out a rectangular bar, ending in an
oblique knob, which latter m the wild rabbit (lig. 16, a) varies a little
in shape and size, as does
the apex of the acromion in
sharpness, and the part just
below the rectangular bar in
breadth. But the variations
in these respects in the wild
rabbit are very slight : whilst
in the large lop-eared rabbits
they are considerable. Thus
in some specimens (b) the
oblique terminal knob is de-
veloped into a short bar,
forming an obtuse angle with
the rectangular bar. In
another specimen (c) these
two unequal bars form nearly
a straight line. The apex of
the acromion varies much in
breadth and sharpness, as
may be seen by comparing
figs. B, c, and d.
Limbs. — In these I could
detect no variation ; but the
bones of the feet were too troublesome to compare with much care,
Fig. 16. — Acromion of Scapula, of natural size.
A. Wild Rabbit. B, C, D, Large, Lop-eared
Rabbits.
I have now described all the differences in the skeletons
which I have observed. 1 1 is impossible not to be struck with
the high degree of variability or plasticity of many of the
bones. We see how erroneous the often-repeated statement
is, that only the crests of the bones which give attachment to
muscles vary in shape, and that only parts of slight Import-
ance become modified under domestication. No one will say, for
instance, that the oc ipital foramen, or the atlas, or the third
cervical vertebra is a part of slight importance. If the several
vertebra? of the wild and lop-eared rabbits, of which figures
have been given, had been found fossil, palaeontologists would
have declared without hesitation that they had belonged to
distinct species.
The effects of the use and disuse of parts. — Tn the large lop-enred
rabbits the relative proportional length of the bones of the same leg,
and of the front and hind legs compared with each other, have
10
130
DOMESTIC RABBITS :
Chap. IV.
romainod nearly tlie same as in the wild rabbit ; but in weight, the
bones of the hind legs apparently have not increased in due pro-
])ortion with the front legs. The weight of the whole body in the
large rabbits examined by me was from twice to twice and a half as
great as tliat of the wild rabbit ; and the weight of the bones of the
front and hind limbs taken togetlier (excluding the feet, on account
of the difficulty of cleaning so many small bones) has increased in
the large lop-eared rabbits in nearly the same proportion; con-
sequently in due proportion to the weight of body which they have
to support. If we take the length of the body as the standard of
comparison, the limbs of the large rabbits have not increased in
length in due proportion by one inch and a half. Again, if we take
as the standard of comparison the length of the skull,^which, as we
have before seen, has not increased in length in due proportion to
the length of body, the limbs will be found to be, proportionally
with those of the wild rabbit, from half to three-quarters of an inch
too short. Hence, whatever standard of comparison be taken, the
limb-bones of the large lop-eared rabbits have not increased in
length, though they have in weight, in full proportion to the other
parts of the frame ; and this, I presume, may be accounted for by
the inactive life which during many generations they have spent.
Nor has the scapula increased in length in due proportion to the
increased length of the body.
The capacity of the osseous case of the brain is a more interesting
point, to which I was led to attend by finding, as previously stated,
that with all domesticated rabbits the length of the skull relatively
to its breadth has greatly increased in comparison with that of the
wild rabbits. If we had possessed a large number of domesticated
rabbits of nearly the same size with the wild rabbits, it would have
been a simple task to have measured and compared the capacities
of their skulls. But this is not the case : almost all the domestic
breeds have larger bodies than wild rabbits, and the lop-eared kinds
are more than double their weight. As a small animal has to exert
its senses, intellect, and instincts equally with a large animal, w^e
ought not by any means to expect an animal twice or thrice as large
as another to have a brain of double or treble the size.^^ Now,
after weighing the bodies of four wild rabbits, and of four large but
not fattened lop-eared rabbits, I find tha,t on an average the wild
are to the lop-eared in weight as 1 to 2T7 ; in average length of
body as I to ITI ; whilst in capacity of skull they are as I to I'I5.
Hence we see that the capacity of the skull, and consequently the
size of the brain, has increased but little, relatively to the increased
size of the body ; and this fact explains the narrowness of the skull
relatively to its length in all domestic rabbits.
See Prof. Owen’s remarks on this
subject in his paper on the ‘Zoological
Significance of the Bi-ain, &c., of Man,
&c.,’ road before Brit- Association
1862 : with respect to Birds, se*i
‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ Jun. 11th, 184B
p. 8.
Chap. IV
EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE.
131
In the upper half of the following table I have given the measure-
ments of the skull of ten wild rabbits; and in the lower half, of
eleven thoroughly domesticated kinds. As these rabbits differ so
greatly in size, it is necessaiy to have some standard by which to
compare the capacities of their skulls. I have selected the length
of skull as the best standard, for in the larger rabbits it has not, as
already stated, increased in length so much as the body ; but as the
skull, like every other part, varies in length, neither it nor any other
part affords a perfect standard. ^
In the first column of figures the extreme length of the sliull is
given in inches and decimals. I am aware that these measurements
pretend to greater accuracy than is possible ; but I have found it
the least trouble to record the exact length which the compass gave.
The second and third columns give the length and weight of body,
whenever these observations were made. The fourth column
gives the capacity of the skull by the weight of small shot with
which the skulls were filled ; but it is not pretended that these
weights are accurate within a few grains. In the fifth column the
capacity is given which the skull ought to have had by calculation,
according to the length of skull, in comparison with that of the wild
rabbit No. 1 ; in the sixth column the difference between the actual
and calculated capacities, and in the seventh the percentage of
increase or decrease, are given. For instance, as the wild rabbit
No. 5 has a shorter and lighter body than the wild rabbit No. I, we
might have expected that its skull would have had less capacity;
the actual capacity, as expressed by the weight of shot, is 875 grains,
which is 97 grains less than that of the first rabbit. But comparing
these two rabbits by the length of their skulls, we see that in No. I
the skull is 3T5 inches in length, and in No. 5 2’96 inches in length ;
according to this ratio, the brain of No. 5 ought to have had a
capacity of 913 grains of shot, which is above the actual capacity,
but only by 38 grains. Or, to put the case in another way (as m
column vii), the braiu of this small rabbit. No. 5, for every 100 grains
of weight is only 4 grains too light, — that is, it ought, according
to the standard rabbit No. 1, to have been 4 per cent, heavier. I
have taken the rabbit No. 1 as the standard of comparison because,
of the skulls having a full average length, this has the least capacity;
so that it is the least favourable to the result which 1 wish to show,
namely, that the brain in all long- domesticated rabbits has decreased
in size, either actually, or relatively to the length of the head and
I'ody, in comparison with the brain of the wild rabbit. Had I taken
the Irish rabbit. No. 3, as the standard, the following results would
have been somewhat more striking.
Turning to the table : the first four wild rabbits have skulls of the
same length, and these differ but little in capacity. The Sandon
rabbit (No. 4) is interesting, as, though now wild, it is known to be
descended from a domesticated breed, as is still shown by its pecu-
liar colouring and longer body ; nevertheless the skull has recovered
its normal length and full capacity. The next three rabbits are wild,
132
DOMESTIC RABBITS:
Chap. IV.
but of small sizo, and they all have skulls with slightly lessened
capacities. The tliree Porto Santo feral rabbits (Nos. 8 to 10) offer
a perplexing case ; their bodies are greatly reduced in size, as in a
lesser degree are their skulls in length and in actual capacity, in
comparison with the skulls of wild English rabbits. But when we
compare the capacities of the skull in th^e three Porto Santo rabbits,
we observe a surprising difference, which does not stand in any
relation to the slight difference in the length of their skulls, nor,
as I believe, to any difference in the size of their bodies ; but I
neglected weighing separately their bodies. I can hardly suppose
that the medullary matter of the brain in these three rabbits, living
under similar conditions, can differ as much as is indicated by the
proportional difference of capacity in their skulls; nor do I know
whether it is possible that one brain may contain considerably more
fluid than another. Hence I can throw no light on this case.
Looking to the lower half of the Table, which gives the measure-
inents of domesticated rabbits, we see that in all the capacity of the
skull is less, but in very various degrees, than might have been
anticipated according to the length of their skulls, relatively to that
of the wild rabbit No. 1. In line 22 the average measurements of
seven large lop-eared I’abbits are given. Now the question arises,
has the average capacity of the skull in these seven large rabbits
increased as much as might have been expected from their greatly
increased size of body. We may endeavour to answer this question
in two ways : in the upper half of the Table we have measurements
of the skulls of six small wild rabbits (Nos. 5 to 10), and we find
that on an average the skulls are T8 of an inch shorter, and in
capacity 91 grains less, than the average length and capacity of
the three first wild rabbits on the list. The seven large lop-eared
rabbits, on an average, have skulls 4T1 inches in length, and 118(3
grains in capacity; so that these skulls have increased in length
more than five times as much as the skulls of the six small wild
rabbits have decreased in length ; hence we might have expected
that the skulls of the large lop-eared rabbits would have increased
in capacity five times as much as the skulls of the six small rabbits
have decreased in capacity; and this would have given an average
increased capacity of 455 grains, whilst the real average increase is
only 155 grains. Again, the large lop-eared rabbits have bodies of
nearly the same weight and size as the common hare, but their
heads are longer ; consequently, if the lop-eared rabbits had been
wild, it might have been expected that their skulls would have had
nearly the same capacity as that of the skull of the hare. But this
is far from being the case ; for the average capacity of the two hare-
skulls (Nos. 23, 24) is so much larger than the average capacity of
the seven lop-eared skulls, that the latter yrould have to be increased
21 per cent, to come up to the standard of the hare.-^
*** This standard is apparently con- Zoolog. Soc.,’ 1861, p. 86) gives 210
wdorably too low, for Dr. Crisp (‘ Proc. grains as the actual weight of thr
CiiAr. IV.
EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE.
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134
DOMESTIC RABBITS :
Chap. IV
I have previously remarked that, if we had possessed many
domestic rabbits of the same average size with the wild rabbit, it
would have been easy to compare the capacity of their skulls. Nov)
the J.Iimalayan, Moscow, and Angora rabbits (Nos. 11, 12, 13 ot
Table) are only a little larger in body and have skulls only a little
longer, than the wild animal, and we see that the actual capacity of
their skulls is less than in the wild animal, and considerably less by
calculation (column 7), according to the difference in the length of
their skulls. The narrowness of the brain-case in these three rabbits
could be plainly seen and proved by external measurement. The
Chinchilla rabbit (No. 14) is a considerably larger animal than the
wild rabbit, yet the capacity of its skull only slightly exceeds that of
the wild rabbit. The Angora rabbit, No. 13, otters the most remark-
able case ; this animal in its pure white colour and length of silky
fur bears the stamp of long domesticity. It has a considerably
longer head and body than the wild rabbit, but the actual capacity
of its skull is less than that of even the little wild Porto Santo
rabbits. By the standard of the length of skull the capacity (see
column 7) is only half of what it ought to have been ! I kept this
individual animal alive, and it was not unhealthy nor idiotic. This
case of the Angora rabbit so much surprised me, that I repeated all
the measurements and found them correct. I have also compared
the capacity of the skull of the Angora with that of the wild rabbit
by other standards, namely, by the length and weight of the body,
and by the weight of the limb-bones ; but by all these standards
the brain appears to be much too small, though in a less degree when
the standard of the limb- bones was used ; and this latter circum-
stance may probably be accounted for by the limbs of this anciently
domesticated breed having become much reduced in weight, from its
long-continued inactive life. Hence I infer that in the Angora
breed, which is said to differ from other breeds in being quieter and
more social, the capacity of the skull has really undergone a remark-
able amount of reduction.
From the several facts above given, — namely, firstly, that
the actual capacity of the skull in the Himalayan, Moscow,
and Angora breeds, is less than in the wild rabbit, though
they are in all their dimensions rather larger animals ;
secondly, that the capacity of the skull of the large lop-eared
rabbits has not been increased in nearly the same ratio as the
capacity of the skull of the smaller Avild rabbits has been
brain of a hare which weighed 7 lbs.,
and 125 grains as the weight of the
brain of a rabbit which weighed 3 lbs.
5 oz., that is, the same weight as the
rabbit No. 1 in my list. Now the
contents of the skull of rabbit No. 1
in shot IS in my table 972 grams;
and according to Dr. Crisp’s ratio of
125 to 210, the skull of the hare
ought to have contained 1632 grains
of shot, instead of only (in the largest
ha.re in my table) 1155 grains.
CiiAr. IV.
EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE.
185
decreased ; an 1 thirdly, that the capacity of the skull in these
same large lop-eared rabbits is very inferior to that of the
hare, an animal of nearly the same size, — I conclude, not-
withstanding the remarkable differences in capacity in the
skulls of the small Porto Santo rabbits, and likewise in the
large lop-eared kinds, that in all long-domesticated rabbits the
brain has either by no means increased in due proportion
with the increased length of the head and increased size of the
body, or that it has actually decreased in size, relatively to what
would have occurred had these animals lived in a state of
nature. When we remember that rabbits, from having been
domesticated and closely confined during many generations,
cannot have exerted their intellect, instincts, senses, and
voluntary movements, either in escaping from various
dangers or in searching for food, we may conclude that their
brains will have been feebly exercised, and consequently
liave suffered in development. We thus see that the most
important and complicated organ in the whole organisation
is subject to the law of decrease in size from disuse.
Finally, let us sum up the more important modifications
which domestic rabbits have undergone, together with their
causes as far as we can obscurely see them. By the supply of
abundant and nutritious food, together with little exercise, and
by the continued selection of the heaviest individuals, the
weight of the larger breeds has been more than doubled.
*The bones of the limbs taken together have increased in
weight, in due proportion with the increased weight of body,
but the hind legs have increased less than the front legs ;
but in length they have not increased in due proportion, and
this may have been caused by the want of proper exercise.
With the increased size of the body the third cervical has as-
sumed characters proper to the fourth cervical vertebra ; and the
eighth and ninth dorsal vertebrsB have similarly assumed cha-
racters proper to the tenth and posterior vertebras. The skull
in the larger breeds has increased in length, but not in due pro-
portion with the increased length of body ; the brain has not
duly increased in dimensions, or lias even actually decreased,
and consequently the bony ease for the brain has remained
narrow, and by correlation has affected the bones of the face
136
DOMESTIC RADI5ITS.
Chap. R,
and the entire length of the skull. The skull has thus
acquired its characteristic narrowness. From unknown causes
the supra-orbital process of the frontal hon(>s and the ■ free
end of the malar bones have increased in breadth ; and in
the larger breeds the occipital foramen is generally much
less deeply notched than in wild rabbits. Certain parts of
the scapula and the terminal sternal bones have become
highly variable in shape. The ears have been increased
enormously in length and breadth through continued selec-
tion ; their weight, conjoined probably with the disuse of
their muscles, has caused them to lop downwards ; and this
has affected the position and form of the bony auditory
meatus; and this again, by correlation, the position in a
flight degree of almost every bone in the upper part of the
skull, and even the position of the condyles of the lower
jaw.
Chap. V.
PIGEONS: DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
13Y
CHAPTER V.
DOMESTIC PIGEONS.
ENUMERATION AND DESCRIPTION OP THE SEVERAL BREEDS — INDIVIDUAL
VARIABILITY — VARIATIONS OF A REMARKABLE NATURE — OSTEOLOGICAL
characters: skull, lower jaw, number op VERTEBRA — CORRELATION
OF GROWTH : TONGUE WITH BEAK ; EYELIDS AND NOSTRILS WITH
WATTLED SKIN — NUMBER OP WING-FEATHERS, AND LENGTH OP WING —
DOLOUR AND DOWN WEBBED AND FEATHERED FEET — ON THE EFFECTS
OF DISUSE — LENGTH OP FEET IN CORRELATION WITH LENGTH OP BEAK
— LENGTH OP STERNUM, SCAPULA, AND FURCULUM — LENGTH OF WINGS —
SUMMARY ON THE POINTS OF DIFFERENCE IN THE SEVERAL BREEDS.
I HAVE been led to study domestic pigeons with particular
care, because the evidence that all the domestic races are
descended from one known source is far clearer than with any
other anciently domesticated animal. Secondly, because many
treatises in several languages, some of them old, have been
written on the pigeon, so that we are enabled to trace the
history of several breeds. And lastly, because, from causes
which we can partly understand, the amount of variation
has been extraordinarily great. The details will often be
tediously minute ; but no one who really wants to understand
the progress of change in domestic animals, and especially
no one who has kept pigeons and has marked the great
difference between the breeds and the trueness with whicli
most of them propagate their kind, will doubt that this
minuteness is worth while. Notwithstanding the clear evi-
dence that all the breeds are the descendants of a single
species, I could not persuade myself until some years had
passed that the whole amount of difference between them, had
ari«eii since man first domesticated the wild rock -pigeon.
I have kept alive all the most distinct breeds, which I could
procure in England or from the Continent ; and have pre-
pared skeletons of all. I have received skins from Persia,
and a large number from India and other quarters of the
138
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
Chap. V.
world.^ Since m}'- admission into two of the London pigeon-
clubs, I have received the kindest assistance from many of tho
most eminent amateurs.^
The races of the Pigeon which can be distinguished, and
which breed true, are very numerous. MM. Boitafd and
Corbie ^ describe in detail 122 kinds; and I could add several
European kinds not known to them. In India, judging from
the skins sent me, there are man}!^ breeds unknown here ; and
Sir W. Elliot informs me tliat a collection imported by an
Indian merchant into Madras from Cairo and Constantinople
included several kinds unknown in India. I have no doubt
that there exist considerabl}’’ above 150 kinds which breed
true and have been separately named. But of these the far
greater number differ from each other only in unimportant
characters. Such differences will be here entirely passed
over, and I shall confine myself to the more important points
of structure. That many important differences exist we
shall presentl}^ see. I have looked through the magnificent
and gave me specimens. I ha I access
to Mr. Wicking's collection, which
contained a greater assortment of
kinds than could anywhere else be
seen ; and he has always aided me
with specimens and information given
in the freest manner. Mr. Haynes
and Mr. Corker have given me speci-
mens of their magnificent Carriers.
To Mr. Harrison Weir 1 am likewise
indebted. .Nor must I by any means
pass over the assistance received from
Mr. J. M. Eaton, Mr. Baker, Mr. Evans,
and Mr. J. Baily, jun., of Mount-
street — to the latter gentleman 1
have been indebted for some valuable
specimens. To all these gentlemen
1 beg permission to return my sincere
and cordial thanks.
® ‘ Les Pigeons de Voli^re et de
Colombier,’ Paris, 1824. During forty-
five years the sole occupation of M.
Corbie was the care of the pigeons
belonging to the Duchess of Berry.
Bonizzi has described a large number
of coloured varieties in Italy: ‘Le
variazioni dei colombi Dumestici
Padova, 1873.
' The Hon. C. Muri*ay has sent me
some very valuable specimens from
Persia ; and H.M. Consul, Mr. Keith
Abbott, has given me information on
the pigeons of the same country. I
am deeply indebted to Sir Walter
Elliot for an immense collection of
skins from Madras, with much infor-
mation regarding them. Mr, Blyth
has freely communicated to me his
stores of knowledge on this and all
other related subjects. The Rajah
Sir James Brooke sent me specimens
from Borneo, as has H.M. Consul,
Mr. Swinhoe, from Amoy in China,
and Dr. Daniel! Irum the west coast
of Africa.
^ Ml’. B, P, Brent, well known for
his various contributions to poultry
liierature, has aided me in every way
di.ring several years : so has Mr.
Tcgetmeier, with unwearied kindness.
Thin latter gentleman, who is well
known for his works on poultry, and
who has largely bred pigeons, has
looked over this and the following
chapters. Mr. Bult formerly showed
me his unriv’alled co-joction of Pouters,
Chap. Y.
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
139
collection of the Colnmhidee in the British Museum, and,
with the exception of a few forms (such as the Didunculus,
Calasnas, Guura, &c.), I do not hesitate to affirm that some
domestic races of the rock-pigeon differ fully as much from
each other in external characters as do the most distinct
natural genera. We may look in vain through the 288
known species ^ for a beak so small and conical as that of the
short-faced tumbler ; for one so broad and short as tliat of
the barb ; for one so long, straight, and narrow, with its
enormous wattles, as that of the English carrier ; for an ex-
panded upraised tail like that of the fantail ; or for an oeso-
phagus like that of the pouter. I do not for a moment pretend
that the domestic races differ from each other in their whole
organisation as much as the more distinct natural genera. 1
refer only to external characters, on which, however, it must
be confessed that most genera of birds have been founded.
When, in a future chapter, we discuss the principle of selection
as followed by man, we shall clearly see why the differences
between the domestic races are almost always confined to
external, or at least to externally visible, characters.
OAving to the amount and gradations of difference between
the several breeds, I have found it indispensable in the follow-
ing classification to rank them under Groups, Eaces, and Sub-
races ; to which varieties and sub - varieties, all strictly
inheriting their proper characters, must often be added.
Even with the individuals of the same sub-variety, when
long kept by different fanciers, different strains can sometimes
be recognised. There can be no doubt that, if well-charac-
terized forms of the several races had been found wild, all
would have been ranked as distinct species, and several of
them would certainly have been, placed by ornithologists in
distinct genera. A good classification of the various domestic
breeds is extremely difficult, owing to the manner in which
many of the forms graduate into each other ; but it is curious
how exactly the same difficulties are, encountered, and the
same rules have to be followed, as in the classification of any
natural but difficult group of organic beings. An “ artificial
* ‘Coup d’Oeil sui TOrure des Paris, 1855. This author makes 288
Pigeons,’ par Prince C. L. Bonaparte, species, ranked under 85 genera.
140
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
ClIAI’. V
classification ” might be followed which would present fewer
difficulties than a “ natural classification but then it would
interrupt many plain affinities. Extreme forms can readily
be defined ; but intermediate and troublesome forms often
destroy our definitions. Forms which maybe called “aber-
rant ” must sometimes be included within groups to which
they do not accurately belong. Characters of all kinds must
be used ; but as with birds in a state of nature, those afforded
by the beak are the best and most readily appreciated. It
is not possiifie to weigh the importance of all the characters
which have to be used so as to make the groups and sub-groups
of equal value. Lastly, a group may contain only one race, and
another and less distinctly defined group may contain several
races and sub-races, and in this case it is difficult, as in the
classification of natural species, to avoid placing too high a
value on the number of forms which a group may contain.
In my measurements I have never trusted to the eye ; and
when speaking of a part being large or small, I always refer
to the wild rock-pigeon (OoZww/fea Zma) as the standard of
comparison. The measurements are given in decimals of an
inch.^
I will now give a brief description of all the principal
breeds. The diagram on the following page may aid the
reader in learning their names and seeing their affinities.
The rock-pigeon, or Golumba livia (including under this name
® As I so often refer to the size of tween the measurements of two wild
the C. livia, or rock-pigeon, it may birds, kindly sent me by Dr. Edmond-
be convenient to give the mean be- stone from the Shetland Islands.
Inches.
Length from feathered base of beak to end of tail 14’2.5
,, „ „ „ to oil-gland 9*5
„ from tip of beak to end of tail 15*02
„ of tail-feathers 4*62
„ from tip to tip of wing 26*75
„ of folded wing 9*25
Deak. — Length from tip of beak to feathered base *77
„ Thickness, measured vertically at distal end of nostrils .. .. *23
„ Breadth, measured at same place *16
Feet — Length horn end of middle toe (without claw) to distal end ofl „
tibia
„ Length from end of middle toe to end of hind toe (without! 2.02
claws) /
^’’eight 14^ ounces.
(JlIAP. V-
desckiption of breeds.
141
two or three closely-aUied sub-species or geographical races,
fig- 17. — The Rock Pigeon, or Columba lfvia.6 The parent-form of all domesticated Pigeons.
® This drawing was made from a by Mr. Tegetmeier. It may be con-
dead bird. The six following figures fidently asserted that the characters
were drawn with great care by Mr. of the six breeds which have been
Luke Wells from living birds selected figui’ed are not in the least exaggerated.
COLUMBA LIVIA oii ROCK-PIGEON.
142
DOMESTIC PIGEONS
Chap. V
Dove cot pigeon.
Swallow.
Spot.
Nun.
English Frill-hack
Laugher.
Trumpeter.
2 a
o a
1-3 l=!
H
§ S
'2 2
O 3
QH
Vo
2 «
§ 8
o
o
OQ
o d
. . « bo
C
2^ S
;g -2
’"•cn 4
da.
C^IAP. V.
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
143
hereafter to be described), may be confidently viewed, as we
shall see in tile next chapter, as the common parent-form.
The names in italics on the right-hand side of the page show
ns the most distinct breeds, or those which have undergone
the greatest amount of modification. The lengths of the
dotted lines rudely represent the degree of distinctness of
each breed from the parent -stock, and the names placed
under each other in the columns show the more or less
closely connecting links. The distances of the dotted lines
from each other approximately represent the amount of
difference between the several bineds.
Group I.
This group includes a single race, that of the Pouters. If
the most strongly marked sub-race be taken, namely, the
Improved English Pouter, this is perhaps the most distinct
of ail domesticated pigeons.
Rage I. — Pouter Pigeons. (Kropftauben, German. Grosses-
gorges, or boulans, French.)
CEsophagus of great size, barely separated from the crop, often
inflated. Body and legs elongated. Beah of moderate dimen-
sions.
Sub-race 1. — The improved English Pouter, when its crop is fully
inflated, presents a truly astonishing appearance. The habit of
slightly inflating the crop is common to all domestic pigeons, but
is carried to an extreme in the Pouter. The crop does not differ,
except in size, from that of other pigeons ; but is less pMnly
separated by an oblique constriction from the oesophagus. The
diameter of the upper part of the oesophagus is immense, even close
up to the head. The beak in one bird which I possessed was
almost completely buried when the oesophagus was fully expanded.
The males, especially when excited, pout more than the females,
and they glory in exercising this power. If a bird will not, to use
the technical expression, “ play,” the fancier, as I have witnessed,
by taking the beak into his mouth, blows him up, like a balloon ;
and the bird, then puffed -up with wind and pride, struts about,
retaining his magnificent size as long as he can. Pouters often
take flight with their crops inflated. After one of my birds had
swallowed a good meal of peas and water, as he flew up in order to
disgorge them and feed his nearly fledged young, I heard the peas
rattling in his inflated crop as if in a bladder. When flying, they
144
DOMES no PIGEONS :
Chap. \'.
often strike the backs of their wings together, and thus make a
clapping noise.
Pouters stand remarkably upright, and their bodies are thin and
elongated. In connexion with this form of body, the ribs aie
Fig. 18. — English Fouler.
g-enerally broader and the vertebrse more numerous than in other
breeds. From their manner of standing their legs appear longer
than they really are, though, in proportion with those of G. Uvia,
the legs and feet are actually longer. The wings appear much
elongated, but by measurement, in relation to the length of body,
Chap. V.
DESGEIPTION OF BREEDS.
145
this is not the case, Tlie beak likewise appears longer, but it is
in fact a little shorter (about -03 of an inch), proportionally with
the size of the body, and relatively to the beak of the rock-pigeon.
The Pouter, though not bulky, is a large bird ; I measured cue
which was Sis inches from tip to tip of wing, and 19 inches frcm
tip of beak to end of tail. In a wild rock-pigeon from the ShetJaifd
Islands the same measurements gave only 28,t and 14f. There are
many sub- varieties of the Pouter of different colours, but these I
pass over.
Sub-race 11. Butch Pouter. — This seems to be the parent-form of
our improved English Pouters. I kept a pair, but I suspect that
they were not pure birds. They are smaller than English pouters,
and less well developed in all their characters. Neumeister^ says
tliat the wings are crossed over the tail, and do not reach to its
extremity.
Sub-race III. The Lille Pouter. — I know this breed only from
description.® It approaches in general form the Dutch Pouter, but
the inflated oesophagus assumes a spherical form, as if the pigeon
had swallowed a large orange, which had stuck close under the
beak. This inflated ball is represented as rising to a level with the
crown of the head. The middle toe alone is feathered. A variety
of this sub-race, called the claquaut, is described by MM. Boitard
and Corbie ; it pouts but little, and is characterised by the habit
of violently hitting its wings together over its back, — a habit which
the English Pouter has in a slight degree.
Sub-race IV. Common German Pouter. — I know this bird only
from the flgures and description given by the accurate Neumeister,
one of the few writers on pigeons who, as I have found, may always
be trusted. This sub race seems considerably different. The
upper part of the oesophagus is much less distended. The bird
stands less upright. The feet are not feathered, and the legs and
beak are shorter. In these respects there is an approach in form
to the common rock-pigeon. The tail-feathers are very long, yet
the tips of the closed wings extend beyond the end of the tail ; and
the- length of the wings, from tip to tip, and of the body, is greater
than in the English Pouter.
Group II.
This group includes three Eaces, namely, Cariiers, Eunts,
and Barbs, which are manifestly allied to each other. I ndeed,
certain carriers and runts pass into each other by such in-
sensible gradations that an arbitrary line has to be diawn
between them. Carriers also graduate through foreign hi eeda
into the rock-pigeon. Yet, if well-characterised Carriers and
^ ‘Dns Ganze der Tanbenzucht
Weimar, 1837, pL 11 and 12.
* Boitard and Corbie, ‘ Les Pigeons,
&c., p. 177, pi. 6.
146
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
Chap. V.
Barbs (see figs. 19 and 20) had existed as wild species, no
ornithologist would liave placed them in the same genus
with each other or with the rock-pigeon. Tliis group may,
as a general rule, be recognised by the beak being long, with
the skin over the nostrils swollen and often carunculated or
wattled, and with that round the eyes bare and likewise
carunculated. The mouth is very wide, and the feet are
large. Nevertheless the Barb, which must be classed in this
same group, has a very short beak, and some runts have very
li ttle bare skin round their eyes.
Eace II. — Carriers. (Tiirkische Tauben ; pigeons turcs,
dragons.)
Beak' elongated, narroio, pointed; eyes surrounded hy much
naked, generally carunculated, skin ; neck and body elongated.
Sub-race I. The English Carrier. — This is a fine bird, of large sizej
close feathered, generally dark-coloured, with an elongated neck.
The beak is attenuated and of wonderful length: in one specimen
it was I‘4 inch in length from the feathered base to the tip ; there-
fore nearly twice as long as that of the rock- pigeon, which measured
only '77. Whenever I compare proportionally any part in the
carrier and rock-pigeon, I take the length of the body from the
base of the beak to the end of the tail as the standard of com-
parison ; and according to this standard, the beak in one Carrier
was nearly half an inch longer than in the rock- pigeon. The upper
mandible is often slightly arched. The tongue is very long. The
development of the carunculated skin or wattle round the eyes,
over the nostrils, and on the lower mandible, is prodigious. The
eyelids, measured longitudinally, were in some specimens exactly
twice as long as in the rock-pigeon. The external orifice or furrow
of the nostrils was also twice as long. The open mouth in its
widest part was in one case 75 of an inch in width, whereas in the
rock-pigeon it is only about "I of an inch. This great width of
mouth is shown in the skeleton by the reflexed edges of the ramus
of the lower jaw. The head is flat on the summit and narrow
between the orbits. The feet are large and coarse ; the length, as
measured from end of hind toe to end of middle toe (without the
claws), was in two specimens 2‘6 inches,; and this, proportionally
with the rock-pigeon, is an excess of nearly a quarter of an inch.
One very fine Carrier measured 31 2 inches from tip to tip of wing.
Birds of this sub-race are too valuable to be flown as carriers.
Sub-race II. Dragons ; Persian Carriers. — The English Dragon
differs from the improved English Carrier in being smaller in all
its dimensions, and in having less wattle round the eyes and ovei
Chap. V.
DESCKIPTION OF BREEDS.
147
the nostrils, and none on the lower mandible. Sir W. Elliot sent
me from Madras a Bagdad Carrier (sometimes called khandesi) the
name of which shows its Persian origin: it would be considered
hero a TPrv noor Dragon ; the body was ot the size of the rock-
pgorwdhTebe^^^ longer, namely,! inch from the ip
to the feathered base. The skin round the eyes was only slightly
148
DOMES TIC PIGEONS :
Chap. V
wattled, whilst that over the nostrils was fairly wattled. The Hon.
C Murray, also, sent me two Carriers direct from Persia; these
had nearly the same character as the Madras bird, being about as
large as tbe rock-pigeon, but tbe beak in one specimen was as much
as ITS in length ; the skin over tbe nostrils was only moderately,
and that round tbe eyes scarcely at all wattled.
Sub-race III. Bagadotfen-Tauhen of Keumeister (Pavdotten- or
TTocker-Taubeu). — I owe to tbe kindness of Mr. Baily, jun., a dead
specimen of this singular breed imported from Germany. It is
certaiuly allied to theEunts; nevertheless, from its close affinity
with Carriers, it will be convenient here to describe it. Tbe beak
is long, and is booked or bowed downwards in a highly remarkable
manner, as will be seen in tbe woodcut to be hereafter given when
I treat of the skeleton. Tbe eyes are surrounded by a wide space
of bright red skin, which, as well as that over the nostrils, is mode-
rately wattled. The breast-bone is remarkably protuberant, being
abruptly bowed outwards. The feet and tarsi are of great length,
larger than in first-rate English Carriers. The whole bird is of
large size, but in proportion to the size of the body the feathers
of the wing and tail are short ; a wild rock-pigeon, of considerably
less size, had tail-feathers 4'6 inches in length, whereas in the large
Bagadotten these feathers were scarcely over 4T inches in length.
EiedeP remarks that it is a very silent bird.
Sub-race J K Bussorah Carrier. — Two specimens were sent me
by Sir W. Elliot from Madras, one in spirits and the other skinned.
The name shows its Persian origin. It is much valued in India,
and is considered as a distinct breed from the Bagdad Carrier,
which forms my second sub- race. At first I suspected that these
two sub-races might have been recently formed by crosses with
other breeds, tliough the estimation in which they are held renders
this improbable ; but in a Persian treatise,^® believed to have been
written about 100 years ago, the Bagdad and Bussorah breeds
are described as distinct. The Bussorah Carrier is of about the
same size as the wild rock-pigeon. The shape of the beak, with
some little carunculated skin over the nostrils, — the much elongated
eyelids, — the broad mouth measured internally, — the narrow head,
■ — the feet proportionally a little longer than in the rock-pigeon, —
and the general appearance, all show that this bird is an undoubted
Carrier; yet in one specimen the beak was of exactly the same
length as in the rock-pigeon. In the other specimen the beak (as
well as the opening of the nostrils) was only a very little longer,
viz., by *08 of an inch. Although there was a considerable space
of bare and slightly carunculated skin round the eyes, that over
the nostrils was only in a slight degree rugose. Sir W. Elliot
* ‘ Di( Taubenzucht,’ Ulm, 1824, s. in 1770: I owe to the great kinduess
42. of Sir Elliot a translation of thif
This treatise was written by curious t.eatise.
Saviid Mohammed Musari, who died
Chap. V.
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
149
informs me that in the living bird the eye seems remarkably large
and prominent, and the same fact is noticed in the Persian treatise ;
but the bony orbit is barely larger than that in the rock-pigeon.
Amongst the several breeds sent to me from Madras by Sir W.
Elliot there is a pair of the Kali Par^ black birds with the beak
slightly elongated, with the skin over the nostrils rather full, and
with a little naked skin round the eyes. This breed seems more
closely allied to the Carrier than to any other breed, being nearly
intermediate between the Bussorah Carrier and the rock-pigeon.
The names applied in different parts of Europe and in India to
the several kinds of Carriers all point to Persia or the surrounding
countries as the source of this Race. And it deserves especial
notice that, even if we neglect the Kali Par as of doubtful origin,
we get a series broken by very small steps, from the rock-pigeon,
through the Bussorah, which sometimes has a beak not at all longer
than that of the rock-pigeon and with the naked skin round the
eyes and over the nostrils very slightly swollen and carunculated,
through the Bagdad sub-race and Dragons, to our improved English
Carriers, which present so marvellous a difference from the rock-
])jgeon or Colurtiha livia.
Race III. — Runts. (Scanderoons : die Florentiner Tauben
and Hinkeltauben of Neumeister; pigeon bagadais, pigeon
remain. )
Beak long, massive ; body of great size.
Inextricable confusion reigns in the classification, affinities, and
naming of Runts. Several characters which are generally pretty
constant in other pigeons, such as the length of the wings, tail,
legs, and neck, and the amount of naked skin round the eyes, are
excessively variable in Runts. When the naked skin over the
nostrils and round the eyes is considerably developed and wattled,
and when the size of body is not very great. Runts graduate in so
insensible a manner into Carriers, that the distinction is quite
arbitrary. This fact is likewise shown by the names given to them
in diff(H’ent parts of Europe. Nevertheless, taking: the most distinct
forms, at least five sub-races (some of them including well-marked
varieties) can be distinguished, which differ in such important
points of structure, that they would be considered as good species
in a state of nature.
Siib-o'uce I. Scanderoon rf English Writers (die Florentiner and
llinkclfcauben of Neumeister). — Birds of this sub-race, of which
1 kept one alive and have since seen two others, differ from the
Bagadotten of Neumeister only in not having the beak nearly so
much curved downwards, and in the naked skin round the eyes
and over the nostrils being hardly at all wattled. Nevertheless
I have felt myself compelled to place the Bagadotten in Race II.,
or that of the Carriers, and the present bird in Race III., or that of
150
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
Chap. V
the Rants, The Scanderoon has a very short, narrow, and elevated
tail ; wings extremely short, so that the first primary feathers were
not longer than those of a small tumbler pigeon I Neck long, much
bowed ; breast-bone prominent. Beak long, being 1-15 inch from
tip to feathered base ; vertically thick ; slightly curved downwards.
The skin over the nostrils swollen, not wattled ; naked skin round,
the eyes, broad, slightly carunculated. Legs long; feet very large.
Skin of neck bright red, often showing a naked medial line, with
a naked red patch at the distal end of the radius of the wing.
My bird, as measured from the base of the beak to the root of the
tail, w^as fully 2 inches longer than the rock-pigeon ; yet the tail
itself was only 4 inches in length, whereas in the rock-pigeon,
which is a much smaller bird, the tail is 4f inches in length.
The Hinkel- or Florentiner Taube of Neumeister (Table XIII.,
fig. 1) agrees with the above description in all the specified charac-
ters (for the beak is not mentioned), except that Neumeister
expressly says that the neck is short, whereas in my Scanderoon
it was remarkably long and bowed; so that the Hinkel forms a
well-marked variety.
Sub -race II. Pigeon cygne and Pigeon bagadrds of Boitard and
Corbie (Scanderoon of French writers). — I kept two of these birds
alive, imported from France. They differed from the first sub-race
or true Scanderoon in the much greater length of the wing and
tail, in the beak not being so long, and in the skin about the head
being more carunculated. The skin of the neck is red ; but the
naked patches on the wings are absent. One of my birds measured
S8h inches from tip to tip of wing. By taking the length of the
body as the standard of comparison, the two wings were no less
than 5 inches longer than those of the rock-pigeon ! The tail was
Gr inches in length, and therefore 2i inches longer than that of the
Scanderoon, — a bird of nearly the same size. The beak is longer,
thicker, and broader .than in the rock-pigeon, proportionally with
the size of body. The eyelids, nostrils, and internal gape of mouth
are all proportionally very large, as in Carriers. The foot, from the
end of the middle to end of hind toe, was actually 2-85 inches in
length, which is an excess of ‘32 of an inch over the foot of the rock-
pigeon, proportionally to the relative size of the two birds.
Sub-racs III. Spanish and Roman Runts. — I am not sure that I
am right in placing these Runts in a distinct sub-race ; yet, if wo
take well-characterized birds, there can be no doubt of the propriety
of the separation. They are heavy, massive birds, with shorter
necks, legs, and beaks than in the foregoing races. The skin over
the nostrils is swollen, but not carunculated ; the naked skin round
the eyes is not very wide, and only slightly carunculated ; and I
have seen a fine so-called 8panish Runt with hardly any naked skin
round the eyes. Of the two varieties to be seen in England, one,
which is the rarer, has very long wings and tail, and agrees pretty
closely with the last sub-race ; the other, with shorter wings and
tail, is apparently the Pigeon rom^iin ordinaire of Boitard and Corbi6.
Chap. V
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
151
These Eunts are apt to tremble like Fantails. They are bad flyers,
A few years ago Mr. Gulliver “ exhibited a Eunt which weighed 1 lb,
14 oz. ; and, as I am informed by Mr. Tegetmeier, two Eunts from
the south of France were lately exhibited at the Crystal Palace, each
of which weighed 2 lbs. 2k oz. A very fine rock-pigeon from the
Shetland Islands weighed only 14^ oz.
Sub-race IV. Tronfo of Aldrovandi (Leghorn Eunt ?). — In Aldro-
vandi’s work published in 1600 there is a coarse woodcut of a great
Italian pigeon, with an elevated tail, short legs, massive body, and
with the beak short and thick. I had imagined that this latter
character so abnormal in the group, was merely a false representa-
tion from bad drawing; but Moore, in his work published in 1735,
says that he possessed a Leghorn Eunt of which “ the beak was
very short for so large a bird.” In other respects Moore’s bird
resembled the first sub-race or Scanderoon, for it had a long bowed
neck, long legs, short beak, and elevated tail, and not much wattle
about the head. So that Aldrovandi’s and Moore’s birds must have
formed distinct varrieties, both of which seem to be now extinct in
Europe. Sir W. Elliot, however, informs me that he has seen in
Madras a short-beaked Eunt imported from Cairo.
Sub-race V. Murassa {adorned Pigeon) of Madras. — Skins of these
handsome chequered birds were sent me from Madras by Sir W,
Elliot. They are rather larger than the largest rock-pigeon, with
longer and more massive beaks. The skin over the nostrils is rather
full and very slightly carunculated, and they have some naked skin
round the eyes ; feet large. This breed is intermediate between the
rock-pigeon and a very poor variety of Eunt or Carrier.
From these several descriptions we see that with Eunts, as with
Carriers, we have a fine gradation from the rock-pigeon (with the
Tronfo diverging as a distinct branch) to our largest and most
massive Eunts. But the chain of affinities, and many points of re-
semblance, between Eunts and carriers, make me believe that these
two races have not descended by independent lines Irom the rock-
pigeon, but from some common parent, as represented in the Table,
which had already acquired a moderately long beak with slightly
swollen skin over the nostrils, and with some slightly carunculated
naked skin round the eyes.
Eace IV. — Barbs. (Indische Tauben ; pigeons polonaiB.)
Beah short, broad, deep ; naJeed skin round the eyes, broad and
carunculated ; skin over nostrils slightly swollen. ♦
Misled by the extraordinary shortness and form of the beak, I did
not at first perceive the near affinity of this Pace to that of Carriers
until the fact was pointed out to me by Mr. Brent. Subsequently,
lifter examining the Bussorah Carrier, I saw that no very great amount
** ‘ Poultry Chronicle,’ vol. ii. p. 573.
152
UOMESTIC riGEONS
Chap. V
of modification would be requisite to convert it into a Barb. This
view of the affinity of Barbs to Carriers is supported by the
analogical difference between the short and long-beaked Eunts ; and
still more strongly by the fact, that young Barbs and Dragons,
within 24 hours after being hatched, resemble each other much more
closely than do young pigeons of other and equally distinct breeds.
Fig. 20.— English Flarb.
CiiAK V. ' DESCiaPTlON OF BREEDS. 1 53
At this early age, the length of beak, the swollen skin over the
rather open nostrils, the gape of the mouth, and the size of the feet,
are the same in l:)oth; although these parts afterwards become
widely dilferent. We thus see that embryology (as the comparison
of very young animals may perhaps be called) comes into play in
the classification of domestic varieties, as with species in a state of
nat are.
Fanciers, with some truth, compare the head and beak of the
Barb to that of a bullfinch. The Barb, if found in a state of nature
would certainly have been placed in a new genus formed for its
reception. The body is a little larger than that of the rock-pigeon,
but the beak is more than '2 of an inch shorter ; although shorter
it is both vertically and horizontally thicker. From the outward
flexure of the rami of the lower jaw, the mouth internally is very
broad, in the proportion of '6 to '4 to that of the rock-pigeon. The
whole head is broad. The skin over the nostril is swollen, but not
caruncnlated, except slightly in first-rate birds when old; whilst the
naked skin round the eye is broad and much carunculated. It is
sometimes so much developed, that a bird^belonging to Mr. Harrison
Weir could hardly see to pick up food from the ground. The
eyelids in one specimen were nearly t^ice as long as those of the
rock-pigeon. The feet are coarse and strong, but proportionally
rather shorter than in the rock-pigeon. The plumage is generally
dark and uniform. Barbs, in short, may be called short-beaked
Carriers, bearing the same relation to Carriers that the Tronfo of
Aldrovandi does to the common Runt.
Group III.
This group is artificial, and includes a heterogeneous collec-
tion of distinct forms. It may be defined by the beak, in
well-characterized specimens of the several races, being
shorter than in the rock -pigeon, and by^ the skin round the
eyes not being much developed.
B,ace V. — Fantails.
Stth-race I. European Favtaih (Pfauentauben ; trer^bleurs).
Tail expanded, directed upwards, formed (f many ftatlitrs ; oib-yland
ihorted ; body and beak rather short.
The normal number of tail-feathers in the gennn Coluraba is 12 ;
hut Fantails have from only 12 (as has been asserted) up to,
according to MM. Boitard cind Corbie, 42. I have counted in one
of my own birds 33, and at Calcutta Mr. Blyth^'-^ has counted in an
imperfect tail 34 feathers. In Madras, as 1 am informed by Sir W.
‘ Annals'and Mag. of Nat. History,’ vol. xix., 184-7, p. 105.
UOMESTIC PIGEONS
CllAl'. V
io4
Elliot, 32 is the standard number ; but in England number is much
less valued than t be position and expansion of the tail. The feathers
are arranged in an irregular double row; their permanent fanlike
Fig. 21— English Pautail.
Chav. V.
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
155
expansion and their upward direction are more remarkable characters
than their increased nnmber. The tail is capable of the same move-
ments as in other pigeons, and can be depressed so as to sweep the
ground. It arises from a more expanded basis than in other pigeons ;
and in three skeletons there were one or two extra coccygeal vertebrae.
I have examined many specimens of various colours from different
countries, and there was no trace of the oil-gland ; this is a curious
case of abortion.^^ The neck is thin and bowed backwards. The
breast is broad and protuberant. The feet are small. The carriage
of the bird is very different from that of other pigeons ; in good
birds the head touches the tail-feathers, which consequently often
become crumpled. They habitually tremble much : and their necks
have an extraordinary, apparently convulsive, backward and forward
movement. Good birds walk in a singular manner, as if their small
feet were stiff. Owing to their large tails, they fly badly on a windy
day. The dark-coloured varieties are generally larger than white
Fantails.
Although between the best and common Fantails, now existing in
England, there is a vast difference in the position and size of the
tail, in the carriage of the head and neck, in the convulsive move-
ments of the neck, in the manner of walking, and in the breadth of
the breast, the differences so graduate away, that it is impossible to
make more than one sub -race. Moore, however, an excellent old
authority says, that in 1785 there were two sorts of broad-tailed
shakers (f. e. fantails), “ one having a neck much longer and more
slender than the other;” and I am informed by Mr B. P. Brent,
that there is an existing German Fantail with a thicker and shorter
beak.
Sub-race II. Java Fantail. — Mr. Swinhoe sent me from Amoy, in
China, the skin of a Fantail belonging to a breed known to have
been imported from Java. It was coloured in a peculiar manner,
unlike any European Fantail ; and, for a Fantail, had a remarkably
short beak. Although a good bird of the kind, it had only 14 tail-
feathers ; but Mr. Swinhoe has counted in other birds of this breed
from 18 to 24 tail-feathers. From a rough sketch sent to me, it is
evident that the tail is not so much expanded or so much upraised
as in even second-rate European Fantails. The bird shakes its neck
like our Fantails. It had a well-developed oil-gland. Fantails
were known in India, as we shall hereafter see, before the year 1600 ;
and we may suspect that in the Java Fantail we see the breed in
its earlier and less improved condition.
This gland occurs in most birds ;
but Nitzsch (in his ‘ Pterylographie,’
1840, p. 55) states that it is absent
in two species of Columba, in several
S}i'icie.s of Psittacus, in some sjiecies of
Otis, and in most or all birds of the
Ostrich family. It can hardly be an
accidental coincidence that tiu two
species of Columba, which are desti-
tute of an oil-gland, have an unusua*
number of tail-feathers, namely 16,
and in this respect resemble Fantails.
See ehe two excellent edition.^
published by Mr. J. M. Eaton in 1852
and 1858, entitled ‘A Treatise on
Fancy Pigeons.’
156
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
Chap. V.
Eace VI— Turbit and Owl. (Moventauben ; pigeons a
cravate.)
Feathers divergent along the front of the neck and breast; beak
very short, vertically rather thick ; oesophagus somewhat enlarged.
Turbits and Owls differ from each other sliglitly in the shape of
the head; the former have a crest, and the beak is differently
curved ; but they may be here conveniently grouped together.
These pretty birds, some of which are very small, can be recognised
at once by the feathers irregularly diverging, like a frill, along the
front of the neck, in the same manner, but in a less degree, as along
the back of the neck in the Jacobin. They have the remarkable
habit of continually and momentarily inflating the upper part of
the oesophagus, which causes a movement in the frill. When
the oesophagus of a dead bird is inflated, it is seen to be larger than
in other breeds, and not so distinctly separated from the crop.
The Pouter inflates both its true crop and oesophagus; the Turbit
inflates in a much less degree the oesophagus alone. The beak of
the Turbit is very short, being ‘28 of an inch shorter than that of the
rock-pigeon, proportionally with the size of their bodies; and in
some owls brought by Mr. E. Yernon Harcourt from Tunis, it was
even shorter. The beak is vertically thicker, and perhaps a little
broader, in 23roportion to that of the rock-pigeon.
Race VII. — Tqmblkks. (Tiimmler, or Burzeltauben ; cul-
butants.)
During flight, tumble backwards; body generally small; beak
generally short, sometimes excessively short and conical.
This race may be divided into four sub-races, namely, Persian,
Lotan, Common, and short-faced Tumblers. These sub-races in-
clude many varieties which breed true. I have examined eight
skeletons of various kinds of Tumblers : excepting in one imperfect
and doubtful specimen, the ribs are only seven in number, whereas
the rock-pigeon has eight ribs.
Sub-race I. Persian Tumblers. — I received a pair direct from Persia,
from the Hon. G. Murray. They are rather smaller birds than the
wild rock-pigeon, about the size of the common dovecot pigeon,
white and mottled, slightly feathered on the feet, with the beak just
perceptibly shorter than in the rock-pigeon. H.M. Consul, Mr.
Keith Abbott, informs me that the difference in the length of beak is
slight, that only practised Persian fanciers can distinguish these
Tumblers from the common pigeon of the country. He informs me
that they fly in floeks high up in the air and tumble well. Some of
Chap. V. DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS. 157
them occasionally appear to become giddy and tumble to the ground,
in which respect they resemble some of our Tumblers.
Sub-race II. Lotan, or Lowtun : Indian Ground Tuniblers. Tnese
birds present one of the most remarkable inherited habits or instincts
ever recorded. The specimens sent to me from Madras by Sir .
J58
DOMESTIC pigeons:
Chap. V
Elliot are wliitc, slightly feathered on the feet, with the feathers
on the head reversed ; and they are rather smaller than the rock or
dovecot pigeon. The beak is proportionally only slightly shorter
and rather thinner than in the rock- pigeon. These birds when
gently shaken and placed on the ground immediately begin tumbling
head over heels, and they continue thus to tumble until taken up
and soothed, — the ceremony being generally to blow in their faces,
as in recovering a person from a state of hypnotism or mesmerism.
It is asserted that they will continue to roll over till they die, if not
taken up. There is aluindant evidence with respect to these remark-
able peculiarities; but what makes the case the more worthy of
attention is, that the habit has been inherited since before the year
1600, for the breed is distinctly described in the ‘ Ayeen Akbery.’
Mr. Evans kept a pair in London, imported by Captain Vigne; and
he assures me that he has seen them tumble in the air, as well as in
the manner above described on the ground. Sir W. Elliot, however,
writes to me from Madras, that he is informed that they tumble
exclusively on the ground, or at a very small height above it. He
also mentions birds of another sub-variety, called the Kalmi Lotan,
which begin to roll over if only touched on the neck with a rod or
wand.
Siih-ra e IT], Common English Tumhlers. — These birds have
exactly the same habits as the Persian Tumbler, but tumble better.
The English bird is rather smaller than the Persian, and the beak
is plainly shorter. Compared with the rock-pigeon, and propor-
tionally with the size of body, the beak is from T5 to nearly '2 of
an inch shorter, but it is not thinner. There are several varieties
of the common Tumbler, namely, Baldheads, Beards, and Dutch
Rollers. 1 have kept the latter alive ; they have differently shaped
heads, longer necks, and are feather-footed. They tumble to an
extraordinary degree ; as Mr. Brent remarks,’® “ Every few seconds
over they go ; one, two, or three summersaults at a time. Here
" and there a bird gives a very quick and rapid spin, revolving like
“ a wheel, though they sometimes lose their balance, and make a
“ rather ungraceful fall, in which they occasionally hurt themselves
“ by striking some object.” From Madras I have received several
specimens of the common Tumbler of India, differing slightly from
each other in the length of their beaks. Mr. Brent sent me a dead
specimen of a “ House-tumbler,” which is a Scot(3h variety, not
16 English translation, by E. Glad-
win, 4th edition, vol. i. The habit
of the Lotan is also described in the
Persian treatise before alluded to,
published about 100 years ago : at this
date the Lotans were generally white
and crested as at present. Mr. Blyth
describes these birds in ‘ Annals and
Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’ vol. xiv., 1847,
p. 101; he says that they “may be
seen at any of the Calcutta bird-
dealers.”
16 ‘ Journal of Horticulture,’ Oct.
22, 1861, p. 76.
ii’ iSee the account of the House-
tumblers kept at Glasgow, in the
‘ Cottage Gardener,’ 1858, p. 285.
Also Mr. Brent’s paper, ‘ Journal of
Horticulture,’ 1861, p. 76.
Chap. V.
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
159
differing in general appearance and form of beak from the common
Tumbler. Mr. Brent states that these birds generally begin to
tumble “almost as soon as they can well fly ; at three months old
“they tumble well, but still fly strong; at five or sb: months they
“ tumble excessively ; and in the second year they mostly give up
“ flying, on account of their tumbling so much and so close to the
“ ground. Some fly round with the flock, throwing a clean snmmer-
“ sault every few yards, till they are obliged to settle from giddiness
“ and exhaustion. These are called Air Tumblers, and they com-
“ monly throw" from twenty to thirty summersaultn in a minute,
“ each clear and clean. I have one red cock that I have on two or
“ three occasions timed by my watch, and counted forty summer-
“ saults in the minute. Others tumble differently. At first they
“ throw a single summersault, then it is double, till it becomes a
“continuous roll, which puts an end to flying, for if they fly a few
“ yards over they go, and roll till they reach the ground. Thus I
“ had one kill herself, and another broke his leg. Many of them
“ turn over only a few" inches from the ground, and will tumble two
“ or three times in flying across their loft. These are called Honse-
“ tumblers, from tumbling in the house. The act of tumbling seems
“ to be one over which they have no control, an involuntary rnove-
“ ment which they seem to try to prevent. I have seen a bird some-
“ times in his struggles fly a yard or two straight upwards, the
“ impulse forcing him backwards while he struggles to go forwards.
“ If suddenly startled, or in a strange place, they seem less able to
“ fly than if quiet in their accustomed loft.” These House-turn biers
differ from the Lotan or Ground Tumbler of India, in not requiring
to be shaken in order to begin tumbling. The breed has probably
been formed merely by selecting the best common Tumblers, though
it is possible that they may have been crossed at some former period
with Lotans.
Sub-race IV. Short-faced Tumblers. — These are mnrvellous birds,
and are the glory and pride of many fanciers. In their extremely
short, sharp, and conical beaks, with the skin over the nostrils but
little developed, they almost depart from the type of the Columbidee.
Their heads are nearly globular and upright in front, so that some
fanciers say^® “the head should resemble a cherry wnth a barley-
corn stuck in it.” These are the smallest kind of pigeons. Mr.
Esquilant possessed a blue Baldhead, tw"o years old, which w'hen
alive weighed, before feeding-time, only 6oz. 5drs. ; two others,
each weighed 7 oz. We have seen that a wild rock-pigeon weighed
14 oz. 2 drs., and a Bunt 34 oz. 4 drs. Short-faced Tumblers have
a remarkably erect carriage, with prominent breasts, drooping wings,
and very small feet. The length of the beak from the tip to the
feathered base was in one good bird only '4 of an inch ; in a wild
rock-pigeon it was exactly double this length. As these Tumblers
have shorter bodies than the wild rock-pigeon, they ought of course
J. M. Eatou’s ‘Treatise on Pigeons,’ 1852, p. S.
160
DOMESTIC PIGEONS : Chap, V
, to have sliorter beaks; but proportionally with the size of tlio body,
the beak is -28 of an inch too short. So, again, the feet of this bird
Fig. 23 — Sho t-laced English Tumbler.
OflAP. V.
DESCEIPTION OF BREEDS.
161
were actually '45 shorter, and proportionally ’21 of an inch shorter,
than the feet of the rock-pigeon. The middle toe has only twelve
or thirteen, instead of fourteen or fifteen scutellaB. The primary
wing-feathers are not rarely nine instead of ten in number. The
improved short -faced Tumblers have almost lost the power of
tumbling; but there are several authentic accounts of their occa-
sionally tumbling. There are several sub-varieties, such as Bald-
lieads. Beards, Mottles, and Almonds; the latter are remarkable
from not acquiring their perfectly-coloured plumage until they have
moulted three or four times. There is good reason to believe that
most of these sub-varieties, some of which breed truly, have arisen
since the publication of Moore’s treatise in 1785.^®
Finally, in regard to the whole group of Tumblers, it is impos-
sible to conceive a more perfect gradation than I have now lying
before me, from the roch-pigeon, through Persian, Lotan, and
common Tumblers, up to the marvellous short-faced birds ; which
latter, no ornithologist, judging from mere external structure, would
place in the same genius with the rock-pigeon. The differences
between the successive steps in this series are not greater than those
which may be observed between common dovecot-pigeons {C. livia)
brought from different countries.
Race YIII. — Indian Frill-back.
Beak very short ; feathers reversed.
A sj)ecimen of this bird, in spirits, was sent to me from Madras
by Sir W. Elliot. It is wholly different from the Frill-back often
exhibited in England. It is a smallish bird, about the size of the
common Tumbler, but Inas a beak in all its proportions like our
short-faced Tumblers. The beak, measured trom the tip to the
feathered base, was only ’46 of an inch in length. The feathers
over the whole body are reversed or curl backwards. Had this bird
occurred in Europe, I should have thought it only a monstrous
variety of our improved Tumbler : but as short-faced Tumblers are
not known in India, I think it must rank as a distinct breed. Pro-
bably this is the breed seen by Hasselquist in 1757 at Cairo, and
said to liave been imported from India.
Race IX. — Jacobin. (Zopf- or Perrfickentaube ; nonnain.)
Feathers of the neck forming a hood ; wings and tail long ; heak
moderately short.
This pigeon can at once be recognised by its hood, almost enclos-
ing the head and meeting in front of the neck. The hood seems to
be merely an exaggeration of the crest of reversed feathers on the
back of the head, which is common to many sub- varieties, and
19 J. M. Eaton’s Treatise, edit. 1858, p. 70.
12
162
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
Chap. Y.
which in tlio Latztauhe is in a nearly intermediate state between
a hood and a crest. The feathers of the hood are elongated. Both
the wings and tail are likewise much elongated ; thus the folded
wing of the. Jacobin, though a somewhat smaller bird, is fully li
inch longer than in the rock-pigeon. Taking the length of the
body without the tail as the standard of comparison, the folded wing,
proportionally with the wings of the rock-pigeon, is 21 inches too
long, and the two wings, from tip to tip, 5i inches too long. In
disposition this bird is singularly quiet, seldom flying or moving
about, as Bechstein and Eiedel have likewise remarked in
Germany.^^ The latter author also notices the length of the wings
and tail. The beak is nearly 2 of an inch shorter in proportion to
the size of the body than in the rock -pigeon ; but the internal gape
of the mouth is considerably wider.
Group IV.
The birds of this group may be characterised by their
resemblance in all important points of structure, especially
in the beak, to the rock-pigeon. The Trumpeter forms the
only well marked race. Of the numerous other sub-races and
varieties I shall specify only a few of the most distinct, which
I have myself seen and kept alive.
Race X. — Trumpeter. (Trommel taube ; pigeon tambour,
glouglou.)
A tuft of feathers at the base of the beak curling forward ; feet
much feathered ; voice very peculiar ; size exceeding that of the
rock-pigeon.
This is a well-marked breed, with a peculiar voice, wholly unlike
that of any other pigeon. The coo is rapidly repeated, and is con-
tinued for several minutes ; hence their name of Trumpeters. They
are also characterised by a tuft of elongated feathers, which curls
forward over the base of the beak, and which is possessed by no
other breed. Their feet are so heavily feathered, that they almost
appear like little wings. They are larger birds than the rock-
pigeon, but their beak is of very nearly the same proportional size.
Their feet are rather small. This breed was perfectly characterised
in Moore’s time, in 1735. Mr. Brent says that two varieties exist,
which differ in size.
Neumeister, ‘ Taubenzucht,’ Tab.
i, fig. i.
Riedel, ‘ Die Taubenzucht,’ 1824.
s. 26. Bechstein, ‘ Naturgeschichte
Deutschlands,’ Band iv. s. 36, 1795.
Chap. V.
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
163
Race '^1.— Scarcely differing in structure from the wild
Columbia livia.
Sub-race I. Laughers. Size less than the Bock-pigeon ; voice very
iu-rvLliar. — As this bird agrees iu nearly all its proportions with the
rockrpigeon, though of smaller size, I should not have thought it
u’oilhy of mention, had it not been for its peculiar voice— a character
supposed seldom to vary with birds. Although the voice of the
Ijaugher is very different from that of the Trumpeter, yet one of miy
Trumpeters used to utter a single note like that of the Laugher. I
have kept two varieties of Laughers, which differed only in one
variety, being turn-crowned ; the smooth-headed kind, for which I
am indebted to the kindness of Mr. Brent, besides its peculiar note,
used to coo iu a singular and pleasing manner, which, independently,
struck both Mr. Brent and myself as resembling that of the turtle-
dove. Both varieties come from Arabia. This breed was known by
Moore in 1785. A pigeon which seems to say Yak-roo is mentioned
in 1600 in the ‘ Ayeen Akbery, ’ and is probably the same breed.
Sir W. Elliot has also sent me from Madras a pigeon called Yahui,
said to have come from Mecca, which does not differ in appearance
from the Laugher; it has “a deep melancholy voice, like Yahu,
often repeated.” Yahu, yahu, means Oh God, oh God; and
Sayzid Mohammed Musari, in the treatise written about 100 years
ago, says that these birds “ are not flown, because they repeat the
name of the most high God.” Mr. Keith Abbott, however, informs
me that the common pigeon is called Yahoo in Persia.
Sub-race II. Common Frill-hack (die Strupptaube) Beak rather
longer than in the rock-pigeon ; feathers reversed. — This is a consider-
ably larger bird than the rock-pigeon, and with the beak, propor-
tionally with the size of body, a little (viz. by ’Ol of an inch) longer.
The feathers, especially on the wing-coverts, have their points curled
upwards or back-wards.
Sub-race III. Nuns (Pigeons coquilles). These elegant birds are
smaller than the rock-pigeon. The beak is actually lY, and propor-
tionally with the size of the body T of an inch shorter than in the
rock-pigeons, although of the same thickness. In young birds the
scutellaa on the tarsi and toes are generally of a leaden-black colour ;
and this is a remarkable character (though observed in a lesser
degree in some other breeds), as the colour of the legs in the adult
state is subject to very little variation in any breed. I have on two
or three occasions counted thirteen or fourteen feathers in the tail ;
triis likewise occurs in the barely distinct breed called Helmets.
Nuns are symmetrically coloured, with the head, primary wing-
feathers, tail, and tail-coverts of the same colour, namely, black or
red, and with the rest of the body white. This breed has retained
the same character since Aldrovandi wrote in 1600. I have received
from Madras almost similarly coloured birds.
Sub-race TV. Spots (die Blasstauben ; pigeons heurtes), — Tliopr
164
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
Chap. V.
birds arc a very little larger than the rock-pigeon, with the beak a
trace smaller in all its dimensions, and with the feet decidedly
smaller. They are symmetrically coloured, with a spot on the
forehead, with the tail and tail-coverts of the same colour, the rest
of the body being white. This breed existed in 1676;^^ and in 1735
Moore remarks that they breed truly, as is the case at the present day.
Sub-race V. Swallows. — These birds, as measured from tip to tip
of wing, or from the end of the beak to the end of the tail, exceed
in size the rock-pigeon ; but their bodies are much less bulky ;
their feet and legs are likewise smaller. The beak is of about the
same length, but rather slighter. Altogether their general appear-
ance is considerably different from that of the rock-pigeon. Their
heads and wings are of the same colour, the rest of the body being-
white. Their flight is said to be peculiar. This seems to be a
modern breed, which, however, originated before the year 1795 in
Grcrmany, for it is described by Bechstein.
Besides the several breeds now described, three or four other very
distinct kinds existed lately, or perhaps still exist, in Germany and
France. Firstly, the Karmeliten, or carme pigeon, which I have
not seen; it is described as of small size, with very short legs, and
with an extremely short beak. Secondly, the Finnikin, which is
now extinct in England. It had, according to Moore’s"^ treatise,
published in 1735, a tuft of feathers on the hinder part of the head,
which ran down its back not unlike a horse s mane. “ When it is
salacious it rises over the hen and turns round three or four times,
flapping its wings, then reverses and turns as many times the other
way.” The Turner, on the other hand, when it plays to the
female, turns only one way.” Whether these extraordinary state-
ments may be trusted I know not; but the inheritance of any
habit may be believed, after what we have seen with respect to
the Ground-tumbler of India. MM. Boitard and Corbie describe a
pigeon which has the singular habit of sailing for a considerable
time through the air, without flapping its wings, like a bird of prey.
The confusion is inextricable, from the time of Aldrovandi in 1600
to the present day, in the accounts published of the Draijers,
Smiters, Finnikins, Turners, Claquers, &c., which are all remark-
able from their manoer of flight. Mr. Brent informs me that he
has seen one of these breeds in Germany with its wing-feathers
injured from having been so often struck together but he did not
see it flying. An old stuffed specimen of a Finnikin in the British
Museum presents no well-marked character. Thirdly, a singular
pigeon with a forked tail is mentioned in some treatises ; and as
Bechstein^^ briefly describes and figures this bird, with a tail “having
22 Willughby’s ‘ Ornithology,’ edit-
ed by Eay.
23 J. M. Eaton’s edition (1858) of
Moore, p. 98.
24 Pigeon pattu plongeur. ‘ Les
Pigeons,’ &c., p. 165.
26 ‘ Naturgeschiclite Deutschlands,’
Band iv. s 47.
Chap. V.
DESCEIPTION OF BEEEDS,
165
completely the structure of that of the house-swallow,” it must once
have existed, for Bechstein was far too good a naturalist to have
confounded any distinct species with the domestic pigeon. Lastly,
an extraordinary pigeon imported from Belguim has lately been
exhibited at the Philoperisteron Society in London, which ‘‘ con-
joins the colour of an archangel with the head of an owl or barb,
its most striking peculiarity being the extraordinary length of the
tail and wing-feathers, the latter crossing beyond the tail, and giving
to the biid the appearance of a gigantic swift (Cypselus), or long-
winged hawk.” Mr. Tegetmeier informs me that this bird weighed
only 10 ounces, but in length was ISi inches from tip to beak
to end of tail, and 321 inches from tip to tip of wing; now the
wild rock-pigeon weighs 141 ounces, and measures from tip to
beak to end of tail 15 inches, and from tip to tip of wing only 261
inches.
I have now described all the domestic pigeons known to
me, and have added a few others on reliable authority. I
have classed them under four Groups, in order to mark their
affinities and degrees of difference; but the third group is
artificial, lire kinds examined by me form eleven races,
which include several sub-races ; and even these latter present
differences that would certainly have been thought of specific
value if observed in a state of nature. The sub-races like-
wise include many strictly inherited varieties ; so that
altogether there must exist, as previously remarked, above
150 kinds which can be distinguished, though generally by
characters of extremely slight importance. Many of the
genera of the Columbidte, admitted by ornithologists, do not
differ in any great degree from each other; taking this into
consideration, there can be no doubt that several of the most
strongly characterised domestic forms, if found wild, would
have been placed in at least five new genera. Thus a new
genus would have been formed for the reception of the
improved English Pouter : a second genus for Carriers and
Bunts ; and this would have been a wide or comprehensive
genus, for it would have admitted common Spanish Bunts
without any wattle, short-beaked Bunts like the Tronfo, and
the improved English Carrier : a third genus vrould have
been formed for the Barb: a fourth for the Fan tail : and
lastly, a fifth for the short beaked, not- wattled pigeons, such
Mr, W. B. Tegetmeier, ‘Journal of Horticulture,’ Jan. 20th, 1863, p. 58.
166
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
Chai>. V
as Turbits and short-faced Tumblers. The remaining do-
mestic forms might have been included, in the same genua
with the wild rock-pigeon.
Individual Variability ; variations of a remarkable nature.
The differences which we have as yet considered are characr-
teristic of distinct breeds ; but there are other differences,
either confined to individual birds, or often observed in
certain breeds but not characteristic of them. These indi-
vidual differences are of importance, as they might in most
cases be secured and accumulated by man’s power of selection
and thus an existing breed might be greatly modified or a
new one formed. Fanciers notice and select only those slight
differences which are externally visible ; but the whole
organisation is so tied together by correlation of growth,
that a change in one part is frequently accompanied by other
changes. For our purpose, modifications of all kinds are
equall}'’ important, and if affecting a part which does not
commonly vary, are of more importance than a modification
in some conspicuous part. At the present day any visible
deviation of character in a well-established breed is rejected
as a blemish; but it by no means follows that at an early
period, before well-marked breeds had been formed, such
deviations would have been rejected; on the contrary, they
would have been eagerly preserved as presenting a novelty,
and would then have been slowly augmented, as we shall here-
after more clearly see, by the process of unconscious selection.
I have made numerous measurements of the various parts of the
body in the several breeds, and have hardly ever found them quite
the same in birds of the same breed, — the differences being greater
than we commonly meet with in wild species within the same
district. To begin with the primary feathers of the wing and tail ;
but I must first mention, as some readers may not be aware of the
fact, that the number of the primary wing and tail-feathers in wild
birds is generally constant, and characterises, not only whole genera,
but even whole families. When the tail-feathers are unusually
numerous, as for instance in the swan, they are apt to be variable
in number ; but this does not apply to the several species and genera
of the Columbidie, which never (as far as I can hear) have less than
twelve or more than sixteen tail-feathers; and these numbers cha-
/
Chap. V
INDIVIDUAL VARIABILITY.
107
racterise, with rare exception, whole sub-families.^ The wild rock-
pigeon has twelve tail-feathers. With Fantails, as we have seen,
the number varies from fourteen to forty-two. In two young birds
in the same nest I counted twenty -two and twenty-seven feathers.
Pouters are very liable to have additional tail-feathers, and I have
seen on several occasions fourteen or fifteen in my own birds. Mr.
Bult had a specimen, examined by Mr. Yarrell, with seventeen tail-
feathers. I had a with thirteen, and another with fourteen
tail-feathers ; and in a Helmet, a breed barely distinguishable from
the Nun, I have counted fifteen, and have heard of otlmr such
instances. On the other hand, Mr. Brent possessed a Dragon, which
during its whole life never had more than ten tail-feathers ; and one
of my Dragons, descended from Mr. Brent’s, had only eleven. I
have seen a Paid-head Tumbler with only ten ; and Mr. Brent
had an Air - Tumbler with the same number, but another with
fourteen tail-feathers. Two of these latter Tumblers, bred by Mr.
Brent, were remarkable, — one from having the two central tail-
feathers a little divergent, and the other from having the two outer
feathers longer by three-eighths of an inch than the others ; so that
in both cases the tail exhibited a tendency, but in different ways, to
become forked. And this shows us how a swallow-tailed breed,
like that described by Bechstein, might have been formed by careful
selection.
With respect to the primary wing-feathers, the number in the
Columbidae, as far as I can find out, is always nine or ten. In the
rock-pigeon it is ten ; but I have seen no less than eight short-faced
Tumblers with only nine primaries, and the occurrence of this
number has been noticed by fanciers, owing to ten primaries of
a white colour being one of the points in Short-faced Paldhead-
Tumblers. Mr. Brent, however, had an Air-Tumbler (not short-
faced) which had in both wings eleven primaries. Mr. Corker, the
eminent breeder of prize Carriers, assures me that some of his birds
had eleven primaries in both wings. I have seen eleven in one
wing in two Pouters. I have been assured by three fanciers that
they have seen twelve in Scanderoons ; but as Neumeister asserts
that in the allied Florence Runt the middle flight-feather is often
double, the number twelve may have been caused by two of the ten
primaries having each two shafts to a single feather. The secondary
ing-feathers are difficult to count, but the number seems to vary
from twelve to fifteen. The length of the wing and tail relatively
to the body, and of the wings to the tail, certainly varies ; I have
esix)cially noticed this in Jacobins. In Mr. Bult’s magnificent col-
‘ Coup-d’oeil sur TOrdre des Pi-
geons,’ par C. L. Bonaparte (‘ Comptes
Rendus’), 1854-55. Mr. Blyth, in
‘ Annals of Nat. Hist.,’ vol. xix., 1847,
p. 41, mentions, as a very singular
fact, “ that of the two species of
Ectopistes, which are nearly allied to
each ether, one should have fourteen
tail-feathers, while the other, the
passenger pigeon of North America,
should possess but the usual number
— twelve.”
168
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
Chai’, V
lection of Ponters, the wings and tail varied greatly in length ; and
were sometimes so much elongated that the birds could hardly play
upright. In the relative length of the few first primaries I have
observed only a slight degree of variability. Mr. Brent informs me
that he has observed the shape of the hrst feather to vary very
slightly. But the variation in these latter points is extremely slight
compared with the differences which may be observed in the natural
species of the Columbidse.
In the beak I have seen very considerable differences in birds of
the same breed, as in carefully bred Jacobins and Trumpeters. In
Carriers there is often a conspicuous difference in the degree of
attenuation and curvature of the beak. So it is indeed in many
breeds : thus I had two strains of black Barbs, which evidently
differed in the curvature of the upper mandible. In width of mouth
I have found a great difference in two Swallows. In Fantails of
first-rate merit I have seen some birds with much longer and thinner
necks than in others. Other analogous facts could be given. We
have seen that the oil-gland is aborted in all Fantails (with the
exception of the sub-race from Java), and, I may add, so hereditary
is this tendency to abortion, that some, although not all, of the
mongrels which I reared from the Faintail and Pouter had no oih
gland ; in one Swallow out of many which I have examined, and in
two Nuns, there was no oil-gland.
The number of the scutellae on the toes often varies in the same
breed, and sometimes even differs on the two feet of the same indi-
vidual; the Shetland rock-pigeon has fifteen on the middle, and six
on the hinder toe; whereas I have seen a Punt with sixteen on the
middle and eight on the hind toe ; and a short-faced Tumbler with
only twelve and five on these same toes. The rock-pigeon has no
sensible amount of skin between its toes; but I possessed a Spot
and a Nun with the skin extending for a space of a quarter of an
inch from the fork, between the two inner toes. On the other hand,
as will hereafter be more fully shown, pigeons with feathered feet
very generally have the bases of their outer toes connected by skin.
I had a red Tumbler, which had a coo unlike that of its fellows,
approaching in tone to that of the Laugher : this bird had the habit,
to a degree which I never saw equalled in any other pigeon, of often
walking with its wings raised and arched in an elegant manner. 1
need say nothing on the great variability, in almost every breed, in
faze of body, in colour, in the feathering of the feet, and in the
feathers on the back of the head being reversed. But I may mention
a remarkable Tumbler^* exhibited at the Crystal Palace, which had
an irregular crest of feathers on its head, somewhat like the tuft on
the head of the Polish fowl. Mr. Bult reared a hen Jacobin with
the feathers on the thigh so long as to reach the ground, and a cock
having, but in a lesser degree, the same peculiarity : from these two
birds he bred others similarly characterised, which were exhibited
De.scribeil and figured lu the ‘Poultry Chronicle,’ vol. iii., 1855, p. 8‘^
CUAI-. V.
SINGULAR VARIATIONS.
169
at the Pliiloperisteron Soc. I bred a mongrel pigeon which had
fibrous feathers, and the wing and tail-feathers so short and imper-
fect that the bird could not fly even a foot in height.
'Jfliere are many singular and inherited peculiarities in the
pi umage of pigeons : thus Almond-Tumblers do not acquire
their perfect mottled feathers until they have moulted three
or four times : the Kite Tumbler is at first brindled black
and red with a barred appearance, but when “ it throws its
nest feathers it becomes almost black, generally with a bluish
tail, and a reddish colour on the inner webs of the primary
wing-feathers.”^® Neumeister describes a breed of a black
colour with white bars on the wing and a white crescent-
shaped mark on the breast ; these marks are generally rusty-
red before the fii’st moult, but after the third or fourth moult
they undergo a change ; the wing-feathers and the crown of
the head likewise then become white or grey.^®
It is an important fact, and I believe there is hardly an
exception to the rule, that the e>2recial characters for which
each breed is valued are eminently variable : thus, in the
Fan tail, the number and direction of the tail-feathers, the
carriage of the body, and the degree of trembling are all
highly variable points ; in Pouters, the degree to which they
2^out, and the shape of their inflated crops ; in the Carrier,
the length, narrowness, and curvature of the beak, and the
amount of v/attle ; in Short-faced Tumblers, the shortness of
the beak, the prominence of the forehead, and general
carriage,®^ and in the Almond-Tumbler the colour of the
plumage; in common Tumblers, the manner of tumbling;
in the Barb, the breadth and shortness of the beak and the
amount of eye- wattle ; in hunts, the size of body ; in Turbits
the frill ; and lastly in d’rumpeters, the cooing, as well as
the size of the tuft of feathers over the nostrils. These,
which are the distinctive and selected characters of the several
breeds, are all eminently variable.
There is another interesting fact with respect to tlie
29 ‘Thp Pigeon Book,’ by Mr. B, P. ‘A Treatise on the Almond -Tum-
Erent, 1859, p, 41. bier, by J. M. Eaton, 1852, p. 8, cl
‘ Dm ctaarh'ilsigo Taiibe. Das passim.
Gau^e, &c.,’ s. 21, tab. i. tig. 4.
170
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
ClIAl>. V
characters of the several breeds, namely, that they are often
most strongly displayed in the male bird. In Carriers, when
the males and females are exhibited in separate pens, the
wattle is plainly seen to be much more developed in the
males, though I have seen a hen Carrier belonging to Mr.
Haynes heavily wattled. Mr. Tegetmeier informs me that,
in twenty Barbs in Mr. P. H. Jones’s possession, the males
had generally the largest eye-wattles ; Mr. Esquilant also
believes in this rule, but Mr. H. Weir, a first-rate judge,
entertains some doubt on the subject. Male Pouters distend
their crops to a much greater size than do the females ; I
have, however, seen a hen in the possession of Mr. Evans
which pouted excellently ; but this is an unusual circumstance.
Mr. Harrison Weir, a successful breeder of prize Fantails,
informs me that his male birds often have a greater number
of tail-fesbthers than the females. Mr. Eaton asserts that
if a cock and hen Tumbler were of equal merit, the hen would
be worth double the money ; and as pigeons always pair, so
that an equal number of both sexes is necessary for repro-
duction, this seems to show that high merit is rarer in the
female than in the male. In the development of the frill in
Turbits, of the hood in Jacobins, of the tuft in Trumpeters,
of tumbling in Tumblers, there is no difference between the
males and females. I may here add a rather different case,
namely, the existence in France of a wine-coloured variety
of the Pouter, in which the male is generally chequered with
black, whilst the female is never so. chequered. Dr. Chapuis
also remarks that in certain light-coloured pigeons the
males have their feathers striated with black, and these strite
increase in size at each moult, so that the male ultimately
becomes spotted with black. With Garners, the wattle, both
A Treatise, &c., p. 10.
Boitard and Corbie", ‘ Les Pigeons,’
&c., 1824, p. 173.
‘Le Pigeon Voyageur Beige,*
1865, p. 87. I have given in my
‘ Descent of Man ’ (6th edit. p. 466)
some curious cases, on the authority
of Mr. Tegetmeier, of silver-coloured
(i. e. very pale blue) birds being
generally females, and of the ease
with which a race thus characterised
could be produced. Bonizzi (see
* Variazioni dei Columbi domestic!
Padova, 1873) states that certain
coloured spots are often different in
the two sexes, and the certain tints
are commoner in females than in male
pigeons.
CilAV. V.
OSTEOLOGIAL DIPFEEENCES.
171
on the beak and round the eyes, and with Barbs chat round
the eyes, goes on increasing with age. This augmentation
of character with advancing age, and more especially the
difference between the males and females in the above-
mentioned several respects, are remarkable facts, for tiierf;
is no sensible difference at any age between the two sexes
in the aboriginal rock-pigeon ; and not often any strongly
marked difference throughout the family of the Columbidai.^=
Osteological Characters.
Ill the skeletons of the various breeds there is much varia-
bility ; and though certain differences occur frequently, and
others rarely, in certain breeds, yet none can be said to be
absolutely characteristic of any breed. Considering that
strongly-marked domestic races have been formed chiefly by
man’s selection, we ought not to expect to find great and
constant differences in the skeleton ; for fanciers neither see,
nor do they care for, modifications of structure in the internal
framework. Nor ought we to expect changes in the skeletons
from changed habits of life ; as every facility is given to the
most distinet breeds to follow the same habits, and the much
modified races are never allowed to wander abroad and
procure their own food in various ways. Moreover, I find,
on comparing the skeletons of Coluyiiha livia, oenas, palu7nbus,
and turtur, which are ranked by all systematists in two or
three distinct though allied genera, that the differences are
extremely slight, certainly less than between the skeletons
of some of the most distinct domestic breeds. How far the
skeleton of the wild rock-pigeon is constant 1 have had no
means of judging, as I have examined only two.
Skull. — The individual bones, especially those at the base, do not
differ in shape. But the whole skull, in its proi)ortions, outline,
and relative direction of the bones, differs greatly in some of the
breeds, as may be seen by comparing the figures of (a) the wild
Prof. A. yewton (‘ Proc. Zoolog,
Soc.,’ 1865, p. 716) remarks that he
knows no species which present any
remarkable sexual distinction ; but Mr.
Wallace iufonri'i me, that in the sub-
family of the Treronidae the sexes often
differ considerably in colour. See
also on sexual differences in theColum-
bida?, Gould, ‘Handbook to the Birds
of Australia,’ vol. ii. pp. lO'd-i-ilh
172
DOMESTIC PIGEONS .*
Chap. V.
rock-pigeon, (b) the Short-faced Tumbler, (c) the English Carrier,
and (d) the Bagadotten Carrier (of Neumeister), all drawn of the
natural size and viewed laterally. In the Carrier, besides the elon-
A
Fig. 24. — Skulls of Pigeons vipwed laterally, of natural size. A. Wiiol Kock-pigeon. Columba
licia. B. Short-faced Tumbler. C. English Carrier. D. Bagadotten Carrier.
gation of the bones of the face, the space between the orbits is pro-
portionally a little narrower than in the rock-pigeon. In the Baga-
dotten the upper mandible is remarkably arched, and the premaxil-
lary bones are proportionally broader In the Short-faced Tumbler
Chap. Y.
OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFEKENCES.
173
the skull IS more globular : all the bones of the face are much
shortened, and the front of the skull and descending nasal bones are
almost perpendicular : the maxillo-jugal arch and premaxillary
bones form an almost straight line; the space between the pro-
minent edges of the eye-orbits is depressed. In the Barb the pre-
maxillary bones are much shortened, and their anterior portion is
thicker than in the rock-pigeon, as is the lower part of the nasal
bone. In two Nuns the ascending branches of the premaxillaries,
near their tips, were somewhat attenuated, and in these birds, as
well as in some others, for instance in the Spot, the occipital crest
over the foramen was considerably more prominent than in the
rock-pigeon.
In the lower jaw, the articular surface is proper tionably smaller
in many breeds than in the rock-pigeon ; and the vertical diameter.
B
Fig. 25. — Lower jaws, seen from above, of natural size. A. Bock-pigeon. B. Runt.
C. Barb.
more especially of the outer part of the articular surface, is con-
siderably shorter. May not this be accounted for by the lessened
use of the jaws, owing to nutritious food having been given during
a long period to all highly improved pigeons ? In Bunts, Carriers,
and Barbs (and in a lesser degree in several breeds), the whole side
of the jaw near the articular end is beut inwards in a highly re-
markable manner ; and the superior margin of the ramus, beyond
the middle, is reflexed in an equally remarkable manner, as may be
seen in the accompanying figures, in comparison with the jaw of
the rock-pigeon. This reflection of the upper margin of the lower
jaw is plainly connected with the singularly wide gape of the
mouth, as has been described in Bunts, Carriers, and Barbs. The
reflection is well shown in fig. 26 of the head of a Bunt seen from
above; here a wide open space may be observed on each side,
between the edges of the lower jaw and of the premaxillary bones.
174
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
Chap. V,
In the rock-pigeon, , and in several domestic breeds, the edges of the
lower jaw on each side come close up to the premaxillary bones, so
Fig. 21. — Laterwl view of jaws, of natural size.
A. Eock-pigeon. B. Short-laeed Tumbler. C.
Bagadoiteu Carrier.
that no open space is left. The degree of
downward curvature of the distal half of
the lower jaw also differs to an extra-
ordinary degree in some breeds, as may be
seen in the drawings (fig. a) of the rock-
Fig. 26.--S’cuii seen pjgeon, (b) of the Shoi't-faced Tumbler,
siiowing the reflexed margin and (c) ot the Bagadotten Carrier of Neu-
of the distal portion of ihe meister. In some Eimts the s.vmphysis of
lower jaw. lower jaw is remarkably solid. Jjo one
would readily have believed that jaws differing in the several
above-specified points so greatly could have belonged to the same
species.
Vertehrce.—Ml the breeds have twelve cervical vertebrae.^® But
in a Bussorah Carrier from India the twelfth vertebra carried a
small rib, a quarter of an inch in length, with a perfect double
articulation.
^ The dorsal vertebras are always eight. In the rock-pigeon all
eight bear ribs ; the eight rib being very thin, and the seventh
having no process. In Pouters all the ribs are extremely broad,
eight bear ribs; the eighth rib being very thin and the seventh
having no process. In Pouters all the ribs are extremely broad,
and, in three out of four skeletons examined by me, the eighth rib
was twice or even thrice as broad as in the rock-pigeon ; and the
I am not sure that I have de-
signated the different kinds of vertebrae
correctly : but I observe that different
anatomists follow in this respect dif-
ferent rules, and, as I use the same
terms in the comparison of all the
skeletons, this, I hope, will net
signify.
Uhap. V.
OSTEOLOGICA.L DIFFERENCES.
175
seventh pair had distinct processes. In many breeds there are
only seven ribs, as in seven out of eight skeletons of various
Tumblers, and in several skeletons of Fantails, Turbits and Nuns.
In all these breeds the seventh pair was very small, and was
destitute of processes, in which respect it differed from the same
rib in the rock-pigeon. In one Tumbler, and in the Bussorah
Carrier, even the sixth pair had no process. The hypapophysis ol
the second dorsal vertebra varies much in development; being
sometimes (as in several, but not all Tumblers) nearly as prominent
as that of the third dorsal vertebra; and the two hypapophyses
together tend to form an ossified arch. The development of the
arch, formed by the hypapophyses of the third and fourth dorsal
vertebrm, also varies considerably, as does the size of the hypapo-
physis of the fifth vertebra.
The rock-pigeon has twelve sacral vertebrae ; but these vary in
number, relative size, and distinctness, in the different breeds. In
Pouters, with their elongated bodies, there are thirteen or even
fourteen, and, as we shall immediately see, an additional number
of caudal vertebrie. In Eunts and Carriers there is generally the
proper number, namely twelve ; but in one Eunt, and in the Bussorah
Carrier, there were only eleven. In Tumblers there are either eleven,
or twelve, or thirteen sacral vertebrae.
The caudal vertebrae are seven in number in the rock-pigeon. In
Fantails, which have their tails so largely developed, there are
eight or nine, and apparently in one case ten, and they are a little
longer than in the rock-pigeon, and their shape varies considerably.
Pouters, also, have eight or nine caudal vertebrae. I have seen eight
in a Nun and Jacobin. Tumblers, though such small birds, always
have the normal number seven ; as have Carriers, with one exception,
in which there were only six.
The following table will serve as a summary, and will show the
most remarkable deviations in the number of the vertebrae and ribs
which I have observed : — ■
Rock Pigeon.
Pouter, from
Mr. Bult.
Tumbler,
Dutch Roller.
Bussorah
Carrier.
Cervical V ertebrso
12
12
12
12
The 12th bore
a small rib.
Dorsal Vertebrse
8
8
i ^
8
„ Ribs
8
The 6th Pair with
processes, the 7th
pair witiiout a
process.
8
The 6th and
7th pair with
processes.
7
The 6th and
7th pair with-
out processes.
7
The 6th and
7th pair with-
out processes.
Sacral Vertebrse
12
14
11
11
Caudal Vertebrae
7
8 or 9
7
7
Totfd Vertebi-ae
31)
42 or 43
38
SS
176
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
Chap. V.
Fig. 28.— Scapula, of natural,
size. A. Rock-pigeon. R.
Short-faced Tumbler.
The pelvU differs very little in any breed. The anterior margin
of the ilium; however, is sometimes a little more equally rounded
on both sides than
in the rock- pigeon.
The ischium is also
frequently rather
more elongated. The
obturator-notch is
sometimes, as in
many Tumblers, less
developed than in
the rock-pigeon. The
ridges on the ilium
are very prominent
in most Bunts.
In the bones of the
extremities I could
detect no difference,
except in their pro-
portional lengths ;
for instance, the
metatarsus in a
Pouter was 1-65 inch, and in a Short-faced
Tumbler only '95 in length; and this is a
gi-eater difference than would naturally follow
from their differently-sized bodies ; but long
legs in the Pouter, and small feet in the
Tumbler, are selected points In some
Pouters the scapula is rather straighter, and
in some Tumblers it is straighter, with the
apex less elongated, than in the rock-pigeon ;
in the woodcut, fig. 28, the scapulae of the
rock-pigeon (a), and of a short-faced Tumbler
(b), are given. The processes at the summit
of the coracoid, which receive the extremities
of the furculurn, form a more perfect cavity in
some Tumblers than in the rock-pigeon : in
Pouters these processes are larger and dif-
ferently shaped, and the exterior angle of
the extremity of the coracoid, which is
articulated to the sternum, is sqnarer.
The two arms of the furculurn in Pouters
diverge less, proportionally to their length,
than in the rock-pigeon ; and the symphysis
is more solid and pointed. In Fantails the ,
degree of divergence of the two arms varies ^^S;29.-^-uTcuia of nam^^
• 111 T z: on j Size. A. SLort-facetl i um-
in a remarkable manner. In fig. 29, b and bier, b and c Fantaii. u.
c represent the furcula of two Fantails ; and Pouter.
it will be seen that the divergence in b is rather less even than in the
CtlAP. V.
CORRELATION OF GROWTH.
177
fTirciilnm of the short-faced, small-sized Tumbler (a), whereas the
divergence in c equals that in a rock-pigeon, or in the Pouter (n),
though the latter is a much larger bird. The extremities of the furcu-
lum, where articulated to the coracoids, vary considerably in outline.
In the sternum the ditferences in form are slight, except in the
size and outline of the perforations, which, both in the larger and
lesser sized breeds, are sometimes small. These perforations, also,
are sometimes either nearly circular, or elongated as is often the
case with Carriers. The postei'ior perforations occasionally are not
complete, being left open posteriorly. The marginal apophyses
forming the anterior perforations vary greatly in development.
The degree of convexity of the posterior part of the sternnm difhrs
much, being sometimes almost perfectly flat. The manubrium is
rather more prominent in some individuals than in others, and the
pore immediately under it varies greatly in size.
Correlation of Growth. — By this term I mean that the whole
organisation is so connected, that when one part varies, other
parts vary ; but which of two correlated variations ought to be
looked at as the cause and which as the effect, or -whether both
result from some common cause, we can seldom or never tell.
T’he point of interest for us is that, when fanciers, by the con-
tinued selection of slight variations, have largely modified one
part, they often unintentionally produce other modifications.
For instance, the beak is readily acted on by- selection, and,
with its increased or diminished length, the tongue increases
or diminishes, but not in due proportion ; for, in a Barb and
Short-faced Tumbler, both of which have very short beaks, the
tongue, taking the rock-pigeon as the standard of comparison,
was proportionally not shortened enough, whilst in two
Carriers and in a Runt the tongue, proportionally with the
beak, was not lengthened enough, thus, in a first-rate English
Carrier, in which the beak from the tip to the feathered base
was exactly thrice as long as in a first-rate Short-faced
Tumbler, the tongue was only a little more than twice as
long. But the tongue varies in length independently of the
beak : thus in a Carrier with a beak 1-2 inch in length, the
tongue was '67 in length : whilst in a Runt which equalled
the Carrier in length of body and in stretch of wings from
tip to tip, the beak wms '92 whilst the tongue was *73 of an
inch in length, so that the tongue was actually longer than
in the carrier with its long beak. The tongue of the Runt
was also very broad at the root. Of two Runts, one had its
13
178
DOMESTIC riGEONS :
CiiAr. V
beak lonc^or by *23 of an incli, whilst its tongue was shorter
by *14 than in the other.
With the increased or diminished length of the beak the
length of the slit forming the external orifice of the nostiils
varies, but not in due proportion, for, talcing the rock-pigeon
as the standard, the orifice in a Short-faced Tumbler was not
shortened in due proportion with its very short beak. On
the other hand (and this could not have been anticipated),
the orifice in three English Carriers, in the Bagadotten
Carrier, and in a Runt (pigeon cygne), was longer by above
the tenth of an inch than would follow from the length of
the beak proportionally with that of the rock-pigeon. In
one Carriei- the orifice of the nostrils was thrice as long as in
the rock-pigeon, though in body and length of beak this bii'd
was not nearly double the size of the rock-pigeon. This
greatly increased length of the orifice of the nostrils seems to
stand partly in correlation with the enlargement of the
wattled skin on the upper mandible and over the nostrils;
and this is a character which is selected by fanciers. So
again, the broad, naked, and wattled skin round the eyes of
Carriers and Barbs is a selected character ; and in obvious
correlation with this, the eyelids, measured longitudinally,
are proportionally more than double the length of those ol
the rock -pigeon.
The great difference (see woodcut No. 27) in the curvature
of the lower jaw in the rock -pigeon, the Tumbler, and Baga-
dotten Carrier, stands in obvious relation to the curvature of
the upper jaw, and more especially to the angle formed by
the maxillo-jugal arch with the premaxillar}^ bones. But in
Carriers, Runts, and Barbs the singular reflexion of the upper
margin of the middle part of the lower jaw (see woodcut
No. 25) is not strictly correlated with the width or divergence
(as may be clearly seen in woodcut No. 26) of the premaxillary
brnes, but with the breadth of the horny and soft parts of the
upper mandible, which are always overlapped by the edges of
the lower mandible.
In Pouters, the elongation of the b ffy is a selected cha-
racter, amd the ribs, as we have seen, have generally become
very broad, with the seventh pair furnished with processes ; the
Chap. V.
CORRELATION OF GROWTH.
i7y
sacral and caudal vertebra3 have been augmented in number;
the sternum has likewise increased in length (but not in the
depth of the crest) by *4 of an inch more than would follow
from the greater bulk of the body in comparison with that
of the rock-pigeon. In Fantails, the length and number of
the caudal vertebrae have increased. Hence, during the
gradual progress of variation and selection, the internal bony
framework and the external shape of the body have been, to
a certain extent, modified in a correlated manner.
Although the wings and tail often vary in length inde-
pendently of each other, it is scarcely possible to doubt tliat
they generall}^ tend to become elongated or shortened in
correlation. This is well seen in Jacobins, and still more
plainly in Emits, some varieties of which have their wings
and tail of great length, whilst others have both very short.
With Jacobins, the remai'kable length of the tail and wing-
feathers is not a character which is intentionally selected by
fanciers ; but fanciers have been trying for centuries, at least
since the year 1600, to increase the lengtli of the reversed
feathers on the neck, so that the hood may more completely
enclose the head ; and it may be suspected that the increased
length of The wing and tail-feathers stand in correlation with
the increased length of the neck- feathers. Short-faced Tumblers
have short wings in nearly due proportion wuth the reduced
size of their bodies ; but it is remarkable, seeing that the
number of the primary wing-feathers is a constant character
in most birds, that these Tumblers generally have only nine
instead of ten primaries. I have myself observed this in
eight birds ; and the Original Columbarian Society reduced
the standard for Bald-head Tumblers from ten to nine white
tlight-feathers, thinking it unfair that a bird which had only
nine feathers should be disqualified for a prize because it had
not ten white flight-feathers. On the other hand, in Carriers
and hunts, which have large bodies and long wings, eleven
primary feathers have occasionally been observed.
Mr. Tegetmeier has informed me of a (mrious and inexpli-
cable case of correlation, namely, that 3^oung pigeons of all
breeds which when mature become white, yellow, silver (^.e.,
extremel}" pale blue), or dun-coloured, are born almost naked ,
J. M. Eaton’s Treatise, edit. 1858, p. 78.
ISO
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
Chap. V.
whereas pigeons of other eolonrs are horn well-clothed witli
down. Mr. Esqnilant, however, has observed tliat yonng
dnn Carriers are not so hare as young dun Barhs and Tuinhlers,
Mr. ']’'egetmeier has seen two young birds in the same nest,
produced from differently coloured parents, which differed
greatly in the degree to which they were at first clothed with
down.
1 have observed another case of correlation which at first
sight appears quite inexplicable, but on which, as we shall
see in a future chapter, some light can be thrown by the law
of homologous parts varying in the same manner. The case
is, that, when the feet are much feathered, the roots of the
feathers are connected by a web of skin, and apparently in cor-
relation with this the two outer toes become connected for a
considerable space by skin. I have observed this in very
many specimens of Pouters, TrumjAeters, Swallows, Eoller-
tumblers (likewise observed in this breed by Mr. -Brent), and
in a lesser degree in other feather-footed pigeons.
The feet of the smaller and larger breeds are of course
much smaller or larger than those of the rock- pigeon ; but
the scutellaj or scales covering the toes and tarsi have not
only decreased or increased in size, but likewise in number.
To give a single instance, 1 have counted eight scutelhe on the
hind toe of a Eunt, and only five on that of a Short-faced
Tumbler. With birds in a state of nature the number of the
scutellai on the feet is usually a constant character. The
length of the feet and the length of the beak apparently
stand in correlation ; but as disuse apparently has affected
the size of the feet, this case may come under the following
discussion.
On the Effects of Disuse. — In the following discussion on the
relative proportions of the feet, sternum, furculum, scapuhe,
and wings, I may premise, in order to give some confidence to
the reader, that all my measurements were made in the same
manner, and that they were made without the least intention
of applying them to the following purpose.
I measured most of the birds which came into my possession, from
the feathered base of the beak (the length of beak itself being so
variable) to the end of the tail, and to the oil-gland, but un-
fortunately (except in a few cases) not to the root of tlie tail ; J
Chap. V
ON THE EFFECTS OF DISUSE.
181
measured each bird from the extreme tip to tip of wing ; and the
length of the terminal folded part of the wing^ from the extremity
of the primaries to the joint of the radius, I measured the feet
without the claws, from the end of the middle toe to the end of
the hind toe; and the tarsus and middle toe together. I have
taken in every case the mean measurement of two wild rock-pigeons
from the Shetland Islands, as the standard of comparison. The
following table shows the actual length of the feet in each bird ;
Table. I.
Pigeons toiili their healcs generally shorter than that of the Rock-pigeon,
proportionally to the size of their bodies.
Name of Breed.
Actual
length
of
Feet
Difference between
actual and calculated
length of feet, in
proportion to length oi
feet and size of bodj
in the Rock-pigeon.
Wild rook-pigeoii (mean measurement') ..
2-02
Too short
t'y
Too long
by
Short-faced Tumbler, bald head
1-57
O'll
„ „ almond
1-60
0-16
Tumbler, red magpie
1*75
0-19
„ l ed common (l)y standard to end
of tail)
1-85
0-07
„ common bald-head
1-85
0-18
• „ roller
1*80
0-06
Turbit
1-75
0-17
1-80
O-Oi
• •
1-84
0 15
Jacobin
1-90
0-02
Trumpeter, white
202
0-00
„ mottled
1 95
0-18
Fautail (by standard to end of tail)
1-85
0 15
71 51
1-95
0*15
„ crested var. „ r
1-95
00
0 0
Indian Frill-back „ ....
1-80
0-19
English Frill -back
2*10
0-03
N un . .
1-82
0-02
Laugher
1 *05
0-10
Barb
2-00
0-03
55
2-00
o' 03
Spot
1-90
0 02
51
0-07
Swallow, red
1-85
0-18
„ blue
200
o’ 03
Pouter
2-42
O-ll
„ German
2-30
0*09
Bussorah Carrier
2-17
0 09
Number of specimens
28
22
5
1
182
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
Chap. V.
and the difftrcnco between the length which the feet ouglit to have
had according to the size of body of each, in comparison with the
size of body and length of feet of the rock-pigeon, calculated (with
a few specified exceptions) by the standard of the length of the body
from the base of the beak to the oil-gland. I have preferred this
standard, owing to the variability of the length of tail. But I have
made similar calculations, taking as the standard the length from
tip to tip of wing, and likewise in most cases from the base of the
t)eak to the end of the tail ; and the result has always been closely
similar. 'To give an example : the first bird in the table, being
a Short-faced Tumbler, is much smaller than the rock-pigeon, and
would naturally have shorter feet; but it is found on calculation to
have feet too short by T1 of an inch, in comparison with the feet of
the rock-pigeon, relatively to the size of the body in these two birds,
as measured from the base of beak to the oil-gland. So again, when
this same Tumbler and the rock-pigeon were compared by the length
of their wings, or by the extreme length of their bodies* the feet of
the Tumbler were likewise found to be too short in very nearly the
same proportion. I am well aware that the measurements pretend
to greater accuracy than is possible, but it was less trouble to write
down the actual measurements given by the compasses in each case
than an approximation.
Table II.
Pigeons with their healis longer tltnn that of the Uorli-pigeon, 'prcrpnvtionalhf
to the size of their Jnulies.
■Name of BreeJ.
Wild rock-pigeon (mean measurement) ..
Actual
length
of
Feet
2*02
1 T)ifF» reiice tx'tween
1 actual atid calculateJ
' length of feet, in
proponion to length of
feet and size of body
in the Kock-pigeon.
Too short Too long
hy by
Carrier
i 2-60
0-31
'2 -GO
0-25
, . . . . - . » , ^ . . - , .
2-tO
0-21
„ Dragon
2-25
O-OG
Biiefitdotten Carrier
2'80
j 0-56
Scanderoon, white
2-8G
I 0-37
„ Pigeon cygiie
2-85
0 • 29
Uunt
2'7o
! 0-27
Number of specimens
8
- 1
In these two tables we see in the first column the actual length
of the feet in thirty-six birds belonging to various breeds, and in
the two other columns we see by how much the feet are t(X) shore
or too long, according to the size of bird, in comparison with the
rock-pigeon. In the first table twenty-two specimens have tlicir
Chap. V.
ON THE EFFECTS OF DISUSE.
183
fuet too short, on an average by a little above the tenth of an inch
(viz. *107) ; and five specimens have their feet on an average a very
little too long, namely, by *07 of an inch. But some of these latter
cases can be explained ; for instance, with Pouters the legs and feet
are selected for length, and thus any natural tendency to a dimi-
nution in the length of the feet will have been counteracted. In
the Swallow and Barb, when the calculation was made on any
standard of comparison besides the one used (viz. length of body
from base of beak to oil-gland), the feet were found to be too small.
In the second table we have eight birds, with their beaks much
longer than in the rock-pigeon, both actually and proportionally with
the size of body, and their feet are in an equally marked manner
longer, namely, in proportion, on an average by *29 of an inch. I
should here state that in Table I. there are a few partial exceptions to
the beak being proportionally shorter than in the rock- pigeon : thus
the beak of the English Frill-back is just perceptibly longer, and that
of the Bussorah Carrier of the same length or slightly longer, than in
the rock-pigeon. The beaks of Spots, Swallows, and Laughers are
only a very little shorter, or of the same proijortional length, but
slenderer. Nevertheless, these two tables, taken conjointly, indicate
])retty plainly some kind of correlation between the length of the
l)eak and the size of the feet. Breeders of cattle and liorses believe
that there is an analogous connection between the length of the
limbs and head; they assert that a race-horse with the head of a
dray-horse, or a grey-hound with the head of a bulldog, would be a
monstrous production. As fancy pigeons are generally kept in
small aviaries, and are abundantly supplied with food, they must
walk about much less than the wild rock-pigeon ; and it may be
admitted as highly probable that the reduction in the size of the
feet in the twenty-two birds in the first table has been caused by
disuse, and that this reduction has acted by correlation on the
beaks of the great majority of the birds in Table I. When, on tho
other hand, the beak has been much elongated by the continued
selection of successive slight increments of length, the feet by corre-
lation have likewise become much elongated in comparison with
those of the wild rock-pigeon, notwithstanding their lessened use.
As I had taken measures from the end of the middle toe to the
heel of the tarsus in the rock-pigeon and in the above thirty-six
birds, I have made calculations analogous with those above given,
and the result is the same — namely, that in the short-beaked
breeds, with equally few exceptions as in the former case, the
middle toe conjointly with the tarsus has decreased in length ;
whereas in the long-beaked breeds it lias increased in length,
though not quite so uniformly as in the former case, for the leg in
some varieties of the Eunt varies much in length.
In an analogous, but converse, allied groups, have larger feet. See
manner, certain natural groups of Prince Bonaparte’s ‘ Coup-d’ceil sur
the Columbidas, from being more ter- i’Order des Pigeons.’
restrial in their habits than other
184
DOMESTIC PIGEONS;
Chap. V.
As fancy pigeons are generally confined in aviaries of moderate
size, and as even when not confined they do not search for their own
food, they must during many generations have used their wings
incomparably less than the wild rock-pigeon. Hence it seemed to
mo probable that all the parts of the skeleton subservient to flight
would be found to be reduced in size. With respect to the sternum,
I have carefully measured its extreme length in twelve birds of
different breeds, and in two wild rock-pigeons from the Shetland
Islands. For the proportional comparison I have tried three
standards of measurement, with all twelve birds namely, the length
from the base of the beak to the oil-gland, to the end of the tail,
and from the extreme tip to tip of wings. The result has been in
each case nearly the same, the sternum being invariably found to
be shorter than in the wild rock-pigeon. I will give only a single
table, as calculated by the standard from the base of the beak to
the oil-gland; for the result in this case is nearly the mean between
the results obtained by the two other standards.
Length of Sternum.
Name of Breed.
Actual
Oength.
Inches.
Too
Short by
Name of Breed.
Actual
Length.
Inches.
Too
Short by
Wild Rock-pigeon
2 -.55
.. 1
Barb
2-3rx
0-34
Pied Scanderoon ..
2-80
0-60
Nun
2-27
0-15
Bagadotten Carrier
2-80
0-17
German Pouter ..
2-36
0 51
Dragon .. .. ...
2-4.0
0-41
Jacobin
2-33
O' 22
Carrier
2-75
0-35
English Frill-back
2-40
0-43
Short faced 'Fumbler
2-05
0-28
1
IS wallow
•
2-45
0-17
This table shows that in these twelve breeds the sternum is of
an average one- third of an inch (exactly •332) shorter, than in the
rock-pigeon, proportionally with the size of their bodies ; so that
the sternum has been reduced by between one-seventh and one-
eighth of its entire length ; and this is a considerable reduction.
I have also measured in twenty-one birds, including the above
dozen, the prominence of the crest of the steruum relatively to its
length, independently of the size of the body. In two of the twenty-
one birds the crest was prominent in the same relative degree as
in the rock-pigeon; in seven it was more prominent; but in fi\e
out of these seven, namely, in a Fantail, two Scanderoons, and two
English Carriers, this greater prominence may to a certain extent
be explained, as a prominent breast is admired and selected by
fanciers; in the remaining twelve birds the prominence was less.
Hence it follows that the crest exhibits a slight, though uncertain,
tendency to be reduced in prominence in a greater degree than docs
the length of the sternum relatively to the size of body, in comparison
with the rock-pigeon.
I have measured the length of the scapula in nine different large
Chap. V.
ON THE EFFECTS OF DISUSE.
185
and small-sized breeds, and in all the scapnla is proportionally
shorter (taking the same standard as before) than in the wild rock-
pigeon. The reduction in length on an average is very nearly one-
fifth of an inch, or about one-ninth of the length of the scapula in
the rock-pigeon.
The arms of the furcula in all the specimens which I compared,
diverged less, proportionally with the size of body, than in the rock-
])igeon ; and the whole furculum was proportionally shorter. Thus
in a Hunt, which measured from tip to tip of wings- 38|- inches, the
furculum was only a very little longer (with the arms hardly more
divergent) tlian in a rock-pigeon which measured from tip to tip
26i inches. In a Barb, which in all its measurements was a little
larger than the same rock-pigeon, the furculum was a quarter of an
inch shorter. In a Pouter, the furculum had not been lengthened
proportionally with the increased length of the body. In a Short-
faced Tumbler, which measured from tip to tip of wings 24 inches,
therefore only 21 inches less than the rock-pigeon, the furculum was
barely two-thirds of the length of that of the rock-pigeon.
We thus clearly see that the sternum, scapulae, and furculum
are all reduced in proportional length ; but when we turn to
the wings we find what at first appears a wholly difierent
and unexpected result. I may here remark that I have not
picked out specimens, but have used every measurement made
by me. Taking the length from the base of beak to the end
of the tail as the standard of comparison, I find that, out of
thirty- five birds of various breeds, tw^enty-five have wings of
greater, and ten have them of less proportional length, than
in the rock-pigeon. But from the frequently correlated
length of the tail and wing-feathers, it is better to take as
the standard of comparison the length from the base of the
beak to the oil-gland ; and by this standard, out of twenty-
six of the same birds which had been thus measured, twenty-
one had wdngs too long, and only five had them too short.
In the twenty-one birds the wings exceeded in length those of
the rock-pigeon, on an average, by 1 3- inch ; whilst in the five
birds they were less in length by only -8 of an inch. As I was
much surprised that the wings of closely confined birds should
thus so frequently have been increased in length, it occmrred
to me that it might be solely due to the greater length of the
wing-feathers ; for this certainly is the case with the Jacobin,
which has wings of unusual length. As in almost every case
I had measured the folded wdngs, I subtracted the length of
I8() DOMESTIC pigeons: Chap. V.
this terminal part from that of the expanded wings, and thus
I. obtained, with a moderate d(}gTee of aceni-acy, the length ot
the wings from the ends of the two radii, answering from
wrist to wrist in our arms. The wings, thus measured in
the same twenty-five birds, now gave a widely dift’eront
result ; for they were proportionally with those of the rook-
pigeon too short in seventeen birds, and in only eight toe
long. Of these eight birds, five were long-beaked,^® and this
fact perhaps indicates that there is some correlation of the
length of the beak with the length of the bones of the wings,
in the same manner as with that of the feet and tarsi. The
shortening of the humerus and radius in the seventeen birds
may probably be attiibuted to disuse, as in the case of the
scapuhe and furculum to which the wing-bones are attached ; —
the lengthening of the wing-feathers, and consequently the
expansion of the wings from tip to tip, being, on the other
hand, as completely independent of use and disuse as is the
growth of the hair or wool on our long-haired dogs or long-
wool led sheep.
To sum up ; we may confidently admit that the length of
the sternum, and frecjuently the prominence of its crest, the
length of the scapulte and furculum, have all been reduced in
size in comparison with the same parts in the rock-pigeon.
And I presume that this may be attributed to disuse or
lessened exercise. The wings, as measured from the ends of
the radii, have likewise been generally reduced in length ;
but, owing to the increased growth of the wing-feathers, the
wings, from tip to tip, are commonly longer than in the rock-
pigeon. The feet, as well as the tarsi conjointly with the
middle toe, have likewise in most cases become reduced ; and
this it is probable has been caused by their lessened use; but
the existence of some sort of correlation between the feet and
beak is shown more plainly than the eftects of disuse. We
It pnhap‘ deserves notice that
besides these five birds two of the
eight were Barbs, which, as 1 have
shown, must be classed in the same
group with the long-beaked Carriers
and Runts. Barbs may properly be
called short beahed Carriers. It
would, therefore, appear as if, during
the reduction of their beaks, their
wings had retained a little of that
excess of length which is characteris-
tic of their nearest relations and pro-
genitors.
SUMMARY OF DIFFERENCES.
Chap. V.
187
have also some laint indication of a similar correlation between
the main bones of the wing and the beak.
Summary on the Points of Difference hetioeen the several Domestie
Paces, and between the individual Birds.— HHlaQ beak, together
with the bones of the face, differ remarkably in length,
bjcadth, shape, and curvature. The skull differs in shape,
and greatly in the angle formed by the union of the pre-
maxillary, nasal, and maxillo-jugal bones. The curvature of
the lower jaw and the reflection of its upper margin, as well
as the gape of the mouth, differ in a highly remarkable
manner. The tongue varies much in length, both in-
dependently and in correlation with the length of the beak.
The development of the naked, wattled skin over the nostrils
and round the eyes varies in an extreme degree. The eyelids
and the external orifices of the nostrils vary in length, and
are to a certain extent correlated with the degree of develop
ment of the wattle. The size and form of the oesophagus
and crop, and their capacity for inflation, differ immensel3\
The length of the neck varies. With the varying shape of
the body, the breadth and number of the ribs, the presence of
jirocesses, the number of the sacral vertebrae, and the length
of the sternum, all vary. The number and size of the
coccygeal vertebrae vary, apparently in correlation with the
increased size of the tail. The size and shape of the perfora-
tions in the sternum, and the size and divergence of the arms
of the furculum, differ. The oil-gland varies in development,
and is sometimes quite aborted. The direction and length of
certain feathers have been much modified, as in the hood of
the Jacobin and the frill of the Turbit. The wing and tail-
feathers generally vary in length together, but sometimes
independently of each other and of the size of the body. 'J'he
number and position of the tail-feather vary to an unparalleled
degree. The primary and secondary wing feathers occasion-
ally vary in number, apparently in con-elation with the
length of the wing. The length of the leg and the size of
the feet, and, in connection .with the latter, the number of
the scutellae, all vary. A web of skin sometimes connects
the bases of the two inner toes, and almost invariably the two
outer toes when the feet are feathered.
The size of the body differs greatly : a Runt has bc'en known
188
DOMESTIC PIGEONS.
Chap. V.
to •weigh more than five times as much as a Short-faced
Tumbler. The eggs differ in size and shape. According to
Parmentier,^® some races use much straw in building their
nests, and others use little ; but I cannot hear of any recent
corroboration of this statement. The length of time required
for hatching the eggs is uniform in all the breeds. The period
at which the characteristic plumage of some breeds is acquired,
and at which certain changes of colour supervene, differs.
Idle degree to which the young birds are clothed with down
when first hatched is different, and is correlated in a singular
manner with the colour of the plumage. The manner of
flight, and certain inherited movements, such as clapping the
wings, tumbling either in the air or on the ground, and the
manner of courting the female, present the most singular
differences. In disposition the several races differ. Some
races are very silent; others coo in a highly peculiar
manner.
Although many different races have kept true in character
during several centuries, as we shall hereafter more fully
see. yet there is far more individual variability in the most
constant breeds than in birds in a state of nature. There is
hardly any exception to the rule that those characters vary
most which are now most valued and attended to by fanciers,
and which consequent!}' are now being improved by continued
selection. This is indirectly admitted by fanciers when they
complain that it is much more difficult to breed high ffincy
pigeons up to the proper standard of excellence than the so-
called toy pigeons, which differ from each other merely in
colour; for particular colours when once acquired are not
liable to continued improvement or augmentation. Some
characters become attached, from quite unknown causes, more
sirougly to the male than to the female sex; so that we have
in certain races, a tendency towards the appearance of secon-
dary sexual characters, of which the aboriginal rock-pigeon
displays not a trace.
Teraminok, ‘Hist. Nat. Gen. dcs
Pigeons et des Gallinaces,’ tom. i,,
1813, p. 170.
This term was used by John
Hunter tor such differences in structure
between the males and females, as are
not directly connected with the act of
reproduction, as the tail of the pea-
cock, the horns of deer, &;c.
Chap. VI. DOMESTIC PIGEONS : THEIR PARENTAGE.
189
CHAPTER YI.
PIGEONS — continued.
ON THE AHOIITGINAL PARENT-STOCK OP THE SEVERAL DOMESTIC RACES—
HABITS OP LIFE — WILD RACES OP THE ROCK -PIGEON — DOVECOT-PIGEONS — ■
I’ROOFS OF THE DESCENT OF THE SEVERAL RACES FROM COLUMBA LIVIA
— FERTILITY OF THE RACES WHEN CROSSED — REVERSION TO THE PLUMAGE
OP THE WILD ROCK-PIGEON — CIRCUMSTANCES FAVOURABLE TO THE FOR-
MATION OF THE RACES — ANTIQUITY AND HISTORY OF THE PRINCIPAL
RACES — MANNER OP THEIR FORMATION — SELECTION — UNCONSCIOUS SE-
LECTION— CARE TAKEN BY FANCIERS IN SELECTING THEIR BIRDS—
SLIGHTLY DIFFERENT STRAINS GRADUALLY CHANGE INTO WELL-MARKED
BREEDS — EXTINCTION OP INTERMEDIATE FORMS — CERTAIN BREEDS REJIAIN
PERMANENT, WHILST OTHERS CHANGE — SUMMARY.
The differences described in tbe last chapter between the
eleven chief domestic races and between individnal birds ot
tbe same race, would be of little significance, if they had not
all descended from a single wild stock. I'he question of their
origin is therefore of fundamental importance, and must be
discussed at considerable length. No one will think this
superfluous who considers the great amount of difference
between the races, who knows how ancient many of them
are, and how truly they breed at the present day. Fanciers
almost unanimously believe that the different races are
descended from several wild stocks, whereas most naturalists
believe that all are descended from the Columha livia or rock-
pigeon.
Temminck 1 has well observed, and Mr. Gould has made
the same remark to me, that the aboriginal parent must have
been a species which roosted and built its nest on rocks ; and
I may add that it must have been a social bird. For all the
domestic races are highly social, and none are known to build
or habitually to roost on trees. The awkward manner in
which some pigeons, kept by me in a summer-house near an
old walnut-tree, occasionally alighted on the barer branches,
* Tcmminck, ‘Hist. Nat. Gen. des Pigeon.s,’ &c., tom. i. p. 191.
190
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
Chap. VI.
was evident.^ Nevertheless, Mr. R. Scot Skirving informs
me that he often saw ciowds of pigeons in Upper Egypt
settling on low trees, but not on palms, in prefeicnce to
alighting on the mud hovels of the natives. In India IMr.
Rlyth^ has been assured that the wild G. livia, var. intermedia,
sometimes roosts in trees. I may here give a curious instance
of compulsion leading to changed habits: the banks of the
Nile above lat. 28° 30' are perpendicular for a long distance,
so that when the river is full the pigeons cannot alight on
the shore to drink, and Mr. Skirving repeatedly saw whole
flocks settle on the water, and drink whilst they floated down
the stream. These flocks seen from a distance resembled
flocks of gulls on the surface of the sea.
If any domestic race had descended from a species which
was not social, or which built its nest and roosted in trees,*^
the .sharp eyes of fanciers would assuredly have detected some
vestige of so different an aborigioal habit. For we have
reason to believe that aboriginal habits are long retained
under domestication. Thus with the common ass we see
signs of its original desert life in its strong dislike to cross
the smallest stream of water, and in its pleasure in rolling in
the dnst. The same strong dislike to cross a stream is
common to the camel, which has been domesticated from a
very ancient period. Young pigs, though so tame, sometimes
S(][uat when frightened, and thus try to conceal themselves
even on an open and bare place. Young turkeys, and occa-
sionally even young fowls, when the hen gives the danger-
cry, run away and try to hide themselves, like young par-
tridges or pheasants, in order that their mother may take
* In works written on the pigeon
by fanciers I have sometimes observed
the mistaken belief expressed that
the species which naturalists called
ground-pigeons (in contradistinction
to arboreal pigeons) do not perch and
build on trees. In these same works
by fanciers wild species resembling
the chief domestic races are often said
to exist in various i)arts of the world;
but such species are quite unknown
to naturalists.
* I have heard through Sir C. Lyell
from Miss Buckley, that some half-
bred Carriers kept during many years
near London regularly settled by day
on some adjoining trees, and, after
being disturbed in their loft by their
young being taken, roosted on them at
night.
^ ‘Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’
2iid ser., \ml. xx., 1857, p. 5<i9 ; and
in a late volume of the Journal of the
Asiatic Society.
Chap. VI.
THEIK PARENTAGE.
191
flight, of which she has lost the power. Ihe mnsk-diich
{Cairina moschata) in its native country often perches and
roosts on trees, ^ and our domesticated musk-ducks, though
such sluggish birds, “are fond of perching on the tops of
barns, walls, &c., and, if allowed to spend the night in the
hen -house, the female will generally go to roost by the side
of the hens, but the drake is too heavy to mount thither with
ease.” ^ We know that the dog, however well and regularly
fed, often buries, like the fox, any superfluous food ; and we
see him turning round and round on a carpet, as if to trample
down grass to form a bed ; we see him on bare pavements
scratching backwards as if to throw earth over his excrement,
although, as I believe, this is never effected even where there
is earth. In the delight with which lambs and kids crowd
together and fiisk on the smallest hillock, we see a vestige of
their foi’mer alpine habits.
We have therefore good reason to believe that all the
domestic races of the pigeon are descended either from some
one or from several species which both roosted and built their
nests on rocks, and were social in disposition. As only live
or six wild species have these habits, and make any near
approach in structure to the domesticated pigeon, I will
enumerate them.
Firstly, the CoJumbaJeucovota resembles certain domestic varieties
in its plumage, with the one marked and never-failing difference of
a white band which crosses the tail at some distance from the
extremity. This species, moreover, inhabits the Himalaya, close to
the limit of perpetual snow; and therefore, as Mr. Blyth has re-
marked, is not likely to have been the parent of our domestic
breeds, which thrive in the hottest countries. Secondly, the C.
rupt'stris^ of Central Asia, which is intermediate^ between the '
leuconota and livid ; but has nearly the same coloured tail as the
former species. Thirdly, the Columha liUoruUs builds and roosts,
according to Temminck, on rocks in the Malayan archipelago; it is
white, excepting parts of the wing and the tip of the tail, which ar(^
black; its legs are livid-coloured, and this is a character not
observed in any adult domestic pigeon ; but 1 need not have
mentioned this species or the closely -allied G. luctiiosa, as they in
® Sir R. Schomburgk, in ‘Journal ® Rev. E. S. Dixon, ‘Oinamental
R. Geograi'h. Soc.,’ vol. xiii., 1844, Poultry,’ 1848, pp. 63, 66
p. 32. ^ Proc. Zoolog. Soc., 1859, p. 400.
102
DOMESTIC riGEONS:
Chap, VI.
fact bclonpj to the genus Carpopho.ga. Fourthly, Columha quine, r,
which ranges from Guinea*^ to Uie Cape of Good Hope, and roosts
either on trees or rocks, according to tlie nature of the country.
This species belongs to the genus StrictoGiias of Reichenhacli, but
is closely allied to Columba; it is to some extent coloured like
certain domestic races, and has been said to be domesticated in
Abyssinia; but Mr Mansfield Parkyns, who collected the birds (d
that country and knows the species, informs me that this is a
mistake. Moreover, the C. guinea is characterized by the feathers
of the neck having peculiar notched tips, — a character not observed
in any domestic race. Fifthly, the Columha oends of Europe, which
roosts on trees, and builds its nest .in holes, either in trees or the
ground ; tliis species, as far as external characters go, might be the
I)arent of several domestic races ; but, though it crosses readily
with the true rock-pigeon, the offspring, as we shall presently see,
are sterile hybrids, and of such sterility there is not a trace when
the domestic races are intercrossed. It should also be observed
that if we were to admit, against all probability, that any of the
foregoing five or six species were tlie parents of some of our
domestic pigeons, not the least light would be thrown on the
chief differences between the eleven most strongly-marked races.
We now come to the best known rock-pigeon, the Columha livia,
which is often designated in Europe pre-eminently as the Pock-
pigeon, and which naturalists believe to be the parent of all the
domesticated breeds. This bird agrees in every essential character
with the breeds which have been only slightly modified. It differs
from all other species in being of a slaty-blue colour, with two black
bars on the wings, and with the croup (or loins) white. Occasionally
birds are seen in Faroe and the Hebrides with the black bars
replaced by two or three black spots ; this form has been named by
Brehm ^ C. amalice, but this species has not been admitted as distinct
by other ornithologists. Graba even found a difference in the bars
on the right and left wings of the same bird in Faroe. Another and
rather more distinct form is either truly wild or has become feral
on the cliffs of England and was doubtfully named by Mr. Bl^^th
as C, affinU, but is now no longer considered by him as a distinct
species. C. effinis is rather smaller than the rock-pigeon of the
Scottish islands, and has a very diferent appearance owing to the
wing-coverts being chequered with black, with similar marks often
extending over the back. The chequering consists of a large black
* Temminck, ‘ Hist. Nat. Gen. des
Pigeons,’ tom. i. ; also ‘ Les Pigeons,
par Mme. Knip and Temminck. Bona-
parte, however, in his ‘ Coup-d'oeil,’
believes that two closely allied species
are confounded together under this
name. The C. leucojephal i of the
West Indies is stated by Temminck to
be a rock-pigeon ; but I am informed
by Mr. Gosse that this is an error.
® ‘Handbuch der NaturgesGi.
Vogel Deutschlands.’
‘ Tagebuch, Keise nach Faro,’
1830, s. 02.
“ ‘Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.’
vol. xix. 1847, p. 102. This e.xcel lent
paper on pigeons is well '.\ortli con-
sulting.
Chap. VI.
THEIK PARENTAGE.
193
spot on tlie two sides, but chiefly on tlie outer side, of each feather.
The wing-bars in the true rock-pigeon and in the chequered
variety are, in fact, due to similar though larger spots symmetrically
crossing the secondary wing-feather and the larger coverts. Hence
tlie chequering arises merely from an extension of these marks to
other parts of the plumage. Chequered birds are not confined to
the coasts of England ; for they were found by Graba at Faroe ; and
W. Thompson says that at Islay fully half the wild rock-pigeons
were chequered. Colonel King, of Hythe, stocked his dovecot with
young wild birds which he himself procured from nests ai the
Orkney Islands ; and several specimens, kindly sent to me by him,
were all plainly chequered. As we thus see that chequered birds
occur mingled with the true rock-pigeon at three distinct sites,
namely, Faroe, the Orkney Islands, and Islay, no importance can
be attached to this natural variation in the plumage.
Prince C. L. Bonaparte,^^ a great divider of species, enumerates,
with a mark of interrogation, as distinct from G. livia, the C. turricola
of Italy, the G. rupestris of Daouria, and the G. schimperi of Abys-
sinia ; but these birds differ from G. Uvia in characters of the most
trifling value. In the British Museum there is a chequered pigeon,
probably the G. schimperi of Bonaparte, from Abyssinia. To these
may be added the G. gymnocyclus of G. R. Gray from W. Africa,
which is slightly more distinct, and has rather more naked skin
round the eyes than the rock-pigeon ; but from information given
me by Dr. Daniell, it is doubtful whether this is a wild bird, for
dovecot-pigeons (which I have examined) are kept on the coast of
Guiriea.
The wild rock-pigeon of India {G. intermedia of Strickland) has
been more generally accepted as a distinct species. It differs chiefly
in the croup being blue instead of snow-white ; but as Mr. Blyth
informs me, the tint varies, being sometimes albescent. When this
foroj is domesticated chequered birds appear, just as occurs in
Europe with the truly wild G. livi i. Moreover we shall immediately
have proof that the blue and white croup is a highly variable
character ; and Bechstein asserts that with dovecot-pigeons in
Germany this is the most variable of all the characters of the
plumage. Hence it may be concluded that G. intermedia cannot be
ranked as specifically distinct from G. Uvia.
In Madeira there is a rock-pigeon which a few ornithologists have
suspected to be distinct from G. Uvia. I have examined numerous
specimens collected by Mr. E. V. Harcourt and Mr. Mason. They
are rather smaller than the rock-pigeon from the Shetland Islands,
and their beaks are plainly thinner, but the thickness of the beak
varied in the several specimens. In plumage there is remarkable
‘ Natural History of Ireland,’ geons,’ ‘ Comptes Rendus,’ 1854-55.
Birds, vol. ii. (1850), p. 11. For Naturgeschichte. Deutschlands^
Sraba, see previous reference. Band iv. 1795, s. 14.
‘Coup-d’oeil sur I’Ordre des Pi-
14
194
DOMESTIC PIGEONS
Chap. VI.
diversity ; some specimens are identical in every feather (I speak
after actual comparison) with the rock-pigeon of the Shetland
Islands ; others are chequered, like C. affmis from the cliffs of
England, but generally to a greater degree, being almost black over
the whole back; others are identical with the so-called Q. intermedia
of India in the degree of blueness of the croup ; whilst others have
this part very pale or very dark blue, and are likewise chequered.
So much variability raises a strong suspicion that these birds are
domestic pigeons which have become feral.
From these facts it can hardly be doubted that G. Uvia, ajjjlnis,
intermedia, and the forms marked with an interrogation by Bonaparte
ought all to be included under a single species. But it is quite
immaterial whether or not they are thus ranked, and whether some
one of these forms or all are the progenitors of the various domestic
kinds, as far as any light can thus be thrown on the differences
betw^een the more strongly-marked races. That common dovecot-
pigeons, which are kept in various parts of the world, are descended
from one or from several of the above-mentioned wild varieties of
C. Uvia, no one who compares them will doubt. But before making
a few remarks on dovecot-pigeons, it should be stated that the wild
rock-pigeon has been found easy to tame in several countries. We
liave seen that Colonel King at Hytlie stocked his dovecot maore
than twenty years ago with young wild birds taken at the Orkney
Islands, and since then they have greatly multiplied. The accurate
Macgillivray asserts that he completely tamed a wild rock-pigeon
in the Hebrides ; and several accounts are on records of these pigeons
having bred in dovecots in the Shetland Islands. In India, as
Captain Hutton informs me, the wild rock-pigeon is easily tamed,
and breeds readily with the domestic kind ; and Mr. Blyth asserts
that wild birds come frequently to the dovecots and mingle freely
with their inhabitants. In the ancient " Ayeen Akbery ’ it is written
that, if a few wild pigeons be taken, ''they are speedily joined by a
thousand others of their kind.”
Dovecot-pigeons are those which are kept in dovecots in a semi-
domesticated state ; for no special care is taken of them, and they
])rocure their own food, except during the severest weather. In
England, and, judging from MM. Boitard and Corbie’s work, in
France, the common dovecot-pigeon exactly resembles the chequered
‘ History of British Birds,’ vol. i.
pp. 275-284. Mr. Andrew Duncan
tamed a rock-pigeon in the Shetland
Islands. Mr. James Barclay, and Mr.
Smith of Uyea Sound both say that
the wild rock-pigeon can be easily
tamed ; and the former gentleman
asserts that the tamed birds breed
four times a year. Dr. Lawrence
Ldinondstone informs me that a wild
rock-pigeon came and settled in his
dovecot in Balta Sound in the Shet-
land Islands, and bred with his
pigeons ; he has also given me other
instances of the wild rock-pigeon
having been taken young and breed-
ing in captivity.
‘Annals and Mag. of Nat,
History,’ vol. xix. 1817, p. 103, an.l
vqI. for 1857, p. 512.
Chap. VI.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
195
variety of C. livia ; but I have seen dovecots brought from Yorkshire
without any trace of chequering, like the wild rock-pigeon of the
Shetland Islands. The chequered dovecots from the Orkney Islands,
after having been domesticated by Colonel King for more than
twenty years, differed slightly from each other in the darkness of
their plumage and in the thickness of their beaks ; the thinnest beak
being rather thicker than the thickest one in the Madeira birds. In
Germany, according toBechstein, the common dovecot- pigeon is not
chequered. In India they often become chequered, and sometimes
pied with white ; the croup also, as I am informed by Mr-. Blyth,
becomes nearly white. I have received from Sir. J. Brooke some
dovecot-pigeons, which originally came from the S. Natonas Islands
in the Malay Archipelago, and which had been crossed with the
Singapore dovecots : they were small and the darkest variety was
extremely like the dark chequered variety with a blue croup from
Madeira ; but the beak was not so thin, though decidedly thinner
than in the rock-pigeon from the Shetland Islands. A dovecot-
pigeon sent to me by Mr. Swinhoe from Foochow, in China, was
likewise rather small, but differed in no other respect. I have
also received through the kindness of Dr. Daniell, four living dovecot-
pigeons from Sierra Leone, these were fully as large as the
Shetland rock-pigeon, with even bulkier bodies. In plumage some
of them were identical with the Shetland rock pigeon, but with the
metallic tints apparently rather more brilliant ; others had a blue
croup, and resembled the chequered variety of (7. intermedia of
India ; and some were so much chequered as to be nearly black.
In these four birds the beak differed slightly in length, but in all it
w^as decidedly shorter, more massive, and stronger than in the wild
rock-pigeon from the Shetland Islands, or in the English dovecot.
When the beaks of these African pigeons were compared with the
thinnest beaks of the wild Madeira specimens, the contrast was great ;
the former being fully one-third thicker in a vertical direction
than the latter ; so that any one at first would have felt inclined to
rank these birds as specifically distinct; yet so perfectly graduated a
series could be formed between the above-mentioned varieties, that
it was obviously impossible to separate them.
To sum up : the wild Columha livia, including under this
name C. affinis, intermedia^ and the other still more closely-
affined geographical races, has a vast range from the southern
coast of Norway and the Faroe Islands to the shores of the
IMediterranean, to Madeira and the Canary Islands, to Abys-
sinia, India, and Japan. It varies greatly in plumage, being
Domestic pigeons of the common published in 1746; they are said, in
kind are mentioned as being pretty accordance with the name which they
numerous in John Barbut’s ‘ Descrip- bear, to have been imported,
tion of the Coast cf Guinea ’(P- 215),
196
DOMESTIC riGEONS:
Chap. VI
in many places chequered with black, and having eitlier a
white or blue croup or loins ; it varies also slightly in the
size of the beak and body. Dovecot-pigeons, which no one
disputes are descended from one or more of the above wild
forms, present a similar but greater range of variation in
])lumage, in the size of body, and in the length and thickness
of the beak. There seems to be some relation between ,the
croup being blue or white, and the temperature of the
country inhabited by both wild and dovecot pigeons ; for
nearly all the dovecot-]3igeons in the northern parts of Europe
have a white croup, like that of the wild European rock-
pigeon ; and nearly all the dovecot-pigeons of India have a
blue croup like that of the wild C. intermedia of India. As in
various countries the wild rock-pigeon has been found easy to
tame, it seems extremely probable that the dovecot-pigeons
throughout the world are the descendants of at least two and
perhaps more wild stocks ; but these, as we have just seen,
cannot be ranked as specifically distinct.
With respect to the variation of (7. livia, we may without
fear of contradiction go one step further. Tiiose pigeon-
fanciers who believe that all the chief races, such as Carriers, '
Pouters, Eantails, &c., are descended from distinct aboriginal
stocks, yet admit that the so-called toy-pigeons, which differ
f] om the rock-pigeon in little except colour, are descended
from this bird. By toy -pigeons are meant such birds as Spots,
Nuns, Helmets, Swallows, Priests, Monks, Porcelains, Swa-
bians, Archangels, Breasts, Shields, and others in Europe, and
many others in India. It would indeed be as puerile to
suppose that all these birds are descended from so many
distinct wild stocks as to suppose this to be the case with the
many varieties of the gooseberry, heartsease, or dahlia. Yet
these kinds all breed true, and many of them include sub-
varieties which likewise transmit their character truly.
They differ greatly from each other and from the rock-pigeon
in plumage, slightly in size and proportions of body, in size
of feet, and in the length and thickness of their beaks. They
differ from each other in these res^^ects more than do dove-
cot-pigeons. Although we may safely admit that dovecot-
pigeons, which vary slightly, and that toy-pigeons, which
Chap. VI.
THEIR TARENTAGE.
197
vary in a greater degree in accordance with their more highly-
domesticated condition, are descended from G. Inna, including
under this name the above - enumerated wild geographical
races ; yet the question becomes far more difficult when we
consider the eleven principal races, most of which have been
profoundly modified. It can, however, be shown, by indirect
evidence of a perfectly conclusive nature, that these principal
races are not descended from so many wild stocks ; and if this
he once admitted, few will dispute that they are the descen-
dants of G. lima, which agrees with them so closely in habits
and in most characters, which varies in a state of nature, and
which has certainly undergone a considerable amount of
variation, as in the toy-pigeons. We shall moreover presently
see how eminently favourable circumstances have been for a
great amount of modification in the more carefully tended
breeds.
The reasons for concluding that the several principal races
are not descended from so many aboriginal and unknowm
stocks may be grouped under the following six heads : — Firstly,
if the eleven chief races have not arisen from the variation of
some one species, together with its geographical races, they
must be descended from several extremely distinct aboriginal
species ; for no amount of crossing between only six or seven
wild forms could produce races so distinct as Pouters, Carriers,
Punts, Fan tails, Turbits, Short-faced Tumblers, Jacobins, and
Trumpeters. How could crossing produce, for instance, a
Pouter or a Fantail, unless the two supposed aboriginal
parents possessed the remarkable characters of these breeds ?
I am aware that some naturalists, following Pallas, believe
that crossing gives a strong tendency to variation, indepen-
dently of the characters inherited from either parent. I hey
believe that it would be easier to raise a Pouter or Fantail
pigeon from crossing two distinct species, neither of which
possessed the characters of these races, than from any single
species. I can find few facts in support of this doctrine, and
bcl ieve in it only to a limited degree ; but in a future chapter
X shall have to recur to this subject. For our present purpose
the point is not material. The question which concerns us is,
whether or not many new and important characters have
U)8
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
CiJAi-. YI
aiisen since man first domesticated the pigeon. On the
ordinary view, variability is due to changed conditions of life ;
on the Pallasian doctrine, variability, or the appearance of
new characters, is due to some mysterious efiect from the cross-
ing of two species, neither of which possesses the characters
in question. In some few instances it is possible that well-
marked races may have been formed by crossing ; for instance,
a Barb might perhaps be formed by a cross between a long-
beaked Carrier, having large eye-wattles, and some short-
beaked pigeon. That many races have been in some degree
modified by crossing, and that certain varieties which are
disiinguished only by peculiar tints have arisen fiom crosses
between differently-coloured varieties, is almost certain. On
the doctrine, therefore, that the chief races owe their differ-
ences to their descent from distinct species, we must admit
that at least eight or nine, or more probably a dozen species,
all having the same habit of breeding and roosting on rocks
and living in society, either now exist somewhere, or formerly
existed, but have become extinct as wild birds. Considering
how carefully wild pigeons have been collected throughout
the world, and what conspicuous birds they are, especially
when frequenting rocks, it is extremely improbable that
eight or nine species, which were long ago domesticated and
therefore must have inhabited some anciently known country,
should still exist in the wild state and be unknown to orni-
thologists.
The hypothesis that such species formerly existed, but have
become extinct, is in some slight degree more probable. But
the extinction of so many species within tlie historical period is
a bold hypothesis, seeing how Uttle influence man has had in
exterminating the common rock-pigeon, which agi ees in all its
habits of life with the domestic races. The C. livia now exists
and flourishes on the small northern islands of Faroe, on many
islands off the coast of Scotland, on Sardinia, and the shores of
the Mediterranean, and in the /centre of India. Fanciers have
sometimes imagined that the several supposed parent -species
were originally confined to small islands, and thus might
readily have been exterminated ; but the facts just given do not
favour the probability of their extinction, even on small islands
Chap. VI.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
199
Kor is it probable, from what is known of the distribution of
birds, that the islands near Europe should have been inhabited
by j)eculiar species of pigeons; and if we assume that distant
oceanic islands were the homes of the supposed parent-species,
we must remember that ancient voyages were tediously slow,
and that ships were then ill-provided with fresh food, so that
it would not have been easy to bring home living birds.
I have said ancient voyages, for nearly all the races of the
pigeon were known before the year 1600, so that the supposed
wild S23ecies must have been cap)tured and domesticated before
that date.
Secondly. — The doctrine that the chief domestic races are
descended from several aboriginal s^Decies, implies that several
species were formerly so thoroughly domesticated as to breed
readily when confined. Although it is easy to tame most wild
birds, ex2)erience shows us that it is difficult to get them to
breed freely under confinement; although it must be owned that
this is less difficult with pigeons than with most other birds.
During the last two or three hundred years, many birds have
been kejot in aviaries, but hardly one has been added to our
list of thoroughly reclaimed species : yet on the above doctrine
we must admit that in ancient times nearly a dozen kinds
of pigeons, now unknown in the wild state, were thoroughly
vdomesticated.
Thirdly. — Most of our domesticated animals have run wild
in various parts of the world ; but birds, owing a^Dparenf ly to
their partial loss of the power of flight, less often than quad-
rujDeds. Nevertheless I have met with accounts showing that
the common fowl has become feral in South America and
perha2)S in West Africa, and on several islands : the turkey
was at one tiine almost feral on the banks of the Parana ; and
the Guinea-fowl has become perfectly wild at Ascension
and in Jamaica. In this latter island the peacock, also,
“has become a maroon bird.” The common duck wanders
from its home and becomes almost wild in Norfolk. Hybrids
between the common and musk-duck which have become wild
have been shot in North America, Belgium, and near the
Caspian Sea. The goose is said to have run wild in La Plata.
The common dovecot - pigeon has become wild at J uan
200
DOMESTIC riGEONS :
Chap. VI
Fernandez, Norfolk Island, Ascension, probably at Madeira, on
the shores of Scotland, and, as is asserted, on the banks of tlie
Hudson in North Anierica.^^ But how different is the case,
when we turn to the eleven chief domestic races of the pigeon,
which are supposed by some authors to be descended from so
many distinct species ! no one has ever pretended that any
one of these races has been found wild in any quarter of the
world ; yet they have been transported to all countries, and
some of them must have been carried back to their native
homes. On the view that all the races are the product of
variation, we can understand why they have not become feral,
for the great amount of modification which they have under-
gone shows how long and how thoroughly they have been
domesticated ; and this would unfit them for a wild life.
Fourthli/. — If it be assumed that the characteristic differences
between the various domestic races are due to descent from
several aboriginal species, we must conclude that man chose
for domestication in ancient times, either intentionally or by
chance, a most abnormal set of pigeons ; for that species
resembling such birds as Pouters, Fantails, Carriers, Barbs,
Short-faced Tumblers, Turbits, &c., would be in the highest
degree abnormal, as compared with all the existing members
of the great pigeon family, cannot be doubted. Thus we
should have to believe that man not only formerly succeeded
in thoroughly domesticating several highly abnormal species,
but that these same species have since all become extinct, or
^Vith respect to feral pigeons
— for Juan Fernandez, see Bertero in
‘ Annal. cles Sc. Nat.,’ tom. xxi. p. 351.
For Norfolk Islands, see Rev. E. S.
Dixon in the ‘ Dovecote,’ 1851, p. 14,
on the authority of Mr. Gould. For
Ascension I rely on MS. information
giren me by Mr. Layard. For the
banks of the Hudson, see Blyth in
‘Annals of Nat Hist.,’ vol. xx., 1857,
p. 511. For Scotland, see Macgillivray,
‘British Birds,’ vol. i. p. 275; also
Thompson’s ‘Nat. Hist, of Ireland,
Birds,’ vol. ii. p. 11. For ducks, see
ReA\ E. S Dixon, ‘ Ornamental
Poultry,’ 1847, p. 122. For the feral
hybrids of the common and musk-
ducks, see Audubon’s ‘ American Or-
nithology,’ and Selys-Longchamp’s
‘ Hybrides dans la Famille des Ana-
tides.’ For the goose, Isidore Geoffroy
St. -Hilaire, ‘ Hist. Nat. Gen.,’ tom. iii.
p. 498. For guinea-fowls, see Gosse’s
‘ Naturalist’s Sojourn in Jamaica,^'
p. 124; and his ‘Birds of lamaica,
for fuller particulars. 1 saw thj
wild guinea-fowl in Ascension. For
the peacock, see ‘A Week at Por^
Royal,’ by a competent authority,
Mr. R. Plill, p. 42. For the turkey
I rely on oral information ; I ascer^
tained that they were not Curassows.
With respect to fowls 1 will give th«>
references in the next chapter.
Chap. VI.
THEIR PARENTAGE.
201
arc at least now unknown. This double accident is so ex-
tremely improbable that the assumed existence of so many
abnormal species would I’equire to be supported by the
strongest evidence. On the other hand, if all the races are
descended from C. livia, we can understand, as will hereafter
be more fully explained, how any slight deviation in structure
which first appeared would continually be augmented by the
preservation of the most strongly marked individuals ; and as
the power of selection would be applied according to man’s
fancy, and not for the bird’s own good, the accumulated
amount of deviation would certainly be of an abnormal
nature in comparison with the structure of pigeons living in
a state of nature.
I have already alluded to the remarkable fact that the cha
racteristic differences between the chief domestic races are
eminently variable ; we see this plainly in the great difference
in the number of the tail-feathers in the Fantail, in the deve-
lopment of the crop in Pouters, in the length of the beak in
Tumblers, in the state of the wattle in Carriers &c. If the? e
characters are the result of successive variations added together
by selection, we can understand why they should be so
variable : for these are the very parts which have varied
since the domestication of the pigeon, and therefore would be
likel}^ still to vary; these variations moreover have been
recently, and are still being accumulated by man’s selection;
therefore they have not as yet become firmly fixed.
Fifthly. — All the domestic races pair readily together, and,
what is equally important, their mongrel offspring are per-
fectly fertile. To ascertain this fact I made many experi-
ments, which are given in the note below; and recently
Mr. Tegetmeier has made similar experiments with the same
result.^^ Tire accurate Neumeister asserts that when dovecots
I have drawn ont a lon^ table of
the various crosses made by fanciers
between the several domestic breeds
but I do not think it worth while pub-
lishing. I have myself made for this
special purpose many crosses, and all
were perfectly fertile. I have united
In one bird five of the most distinct
races, and with patience I might un-
doubtedly have thus united all. The
case of five distinct breeds being
blended together with unimpaired fer-
tility is important, because Gartner
has shown that it is a very general,
though not, as he thought, universal
rule, that complex crosses between
several species are excessively sterilo,
I have met with only two or three
202
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
Chap. VI.
aie crossed with pigeons of any other breed, the mongrels are
extremely fertile and hardy. MM. Boita d and Corbie affirm,
after their great experience, that the more distinct the breeds
are \s'hich are crossed, the more productive are their mongrel
offspring. I admit that the doctrine first broached by Pallas
is highly probable, if not actually proved, namely, that closely
allied species, which in a state of nature or when first captured
would have been in some degree sterile if crossed, lose this
sterility after a long course of domestication ; yet when wo
consider the great difference between such races as Pouters,
Carriers, Kunts, Fantails, Turbits, Tumblers, &c., the fact of
their perfect, or even increased, fertility when intercrossed in
tlie most complicated manner becomes a strong ai’gumejit in
I’avour of their having all descended from a single species.
This argument is rendered much stronger when we hear (I
append in a note all the cases which I have collected) that
cases of reported sterility in the off-
spring of certain races when crossed.
Pistor (‘ Das Ganze der Feldtau-
benzucht,’ 1831, s. 15) asserts that the
mongrels from Barbs and Fantails
are sterile : I have proved this to be
erroneous, not only by crossing those
hybrids with several other hybrids of
the same parentage, but by the more
severe test of pairing brother and
sister hybrids inter se, and they were
perfectlif fertile. Temminck has stated
(‘ Hist. Nat. Gen. des Pigeons,’ tom. i.
p. 197) that the Turbit or Owl will
not cross readily with other breeds :
but my Turbits crossed, when left free
with Almond Tumblers and with
Trumpeters ; the same thing has
occurred (Rev. E. S. Dixon. ‘ The
Dovecot,’ p. 107) between Turbits and
Dovecots and Nuns. I have crossed
Turbits with Barbs, as has M. Boitard
(p, 34), who says the hybrids were
very fertile. Hybrids from a Turbit
and Fantail have been known to breed
inter se (Riedel, ‘ Taubenzucht,’ s. 25,
and Bechstein, ‘ Naturgesch. Deutsch.’
B. iv. s. 44. Turbits (Riedel, s. 26)
have been crossed with Pouters and
uith Jacobins, and with a hybrid
Jacobin-trumpeter (Riedel, s. 27)*
The latter author has, however, made
some vague statements (s. 22) on the
sterility of Turbits when crossed with
certain other crossed breeds. But I
have little doubt that the Rev. E. S.
Dixon’s explanation of such statements
is correct, viz. that individual birds
both with Turbits and other oreeds are
occasionally sterile.
‘ Das Ganze der Taubenzucht,’
s. 18.
‘ Les Pigeons,’ &c., p. 35.
Domestic pigeons pair readily
with the allied C. cenas (Bechstein,
‘ Naturgesch. Deutschlauds,’ B. iv. s.
3) ; and Mr. Brent has made the same
cross several times in England, but the
young were very apt to die at about
ten days old; one hybrid which he
reared (from C. cenas and a male Anv
werp Carrier) paired with a Dragon,
but never laid eggs. Bechstein fur-
ther states (s. 26) that the domestic
pigeon will cross with C. palumbusy
Turtur risorirc and T. vulgaris, but
nothing is said of the fertility of the
hybrids, and this would have been
mentioned had the fact been ascer-
tained. In the Zoological Gardens
Chap. VI.
THEIR PAREiyfTAGE.
203
hardly a single well-ascertained instance is known of hybrids
between two true species of pigeons being fertile, inter se, or
even when crossed with one of their pure parents.
Sixthly. — Excluding certain important characteristic differ-
ences, the chief races agree most closely both with each other
and with C.livia in all other respects. As previously observed,
all are eminently sociable ; all dislike to perch or roost, and
refuse to build in trees: all lay tw^o eggs, and this is not a
universal rule with the Columbidae ; all, as far as I can hear,
require the same time for hatching their eggs ; all can endui e
the same great range of climate ; all prefer the same food, and
are passionately fond of salt; all exhibit (with the asserted
exception of the Finnikin and Turner which do not differ much
in any other character) the same peculiar gestures when court-
ing the females ; and all (with the exception of Ti umpeters
(M3, report to me from Mr. James
Hunt) a male hybrid from Turtur
vulgaris and a domestic pigeon “ paired
with several different species of
pigeons and doves, but none of the
eggs were good.” Hybrids from C.
CB/iasand gymnoiohthahnos were sterile.
In Loudon’s ‘ Mag. of Nat. Hist.’ vol.
vii. 1834, p. 154, it is said that a male
hybrid (from Turtur vulgaris male,
and the cream-coloured 2’. risoria
female) paired during two years with
a female T. risoria, and the latter laid
many eggs, out all were sterile.
MM. Boitard andCorbie'(‘Les Pigeons,’
p. 235) state that the hybrids from
these two turtle-doves are invariably
sterile both inter se and with either
pure parent. The experiment was
tried by M. Corbie avec une espbee
d’obstination and likewise by M.
IMauduyt, and by M. Vieillot. Tern-
minck also found the hybrids from
these two species quite barren. There-
fore, when Bechstein (‘ Naturgesch.
Deutschlands Vogel,’ B. 4, s. 101)
asserts that the hybrids from these
two turtle-doves propagate inter se
equally well with pure species, and
when a writer in the ‘Field ’news-
paper (in a letter dated Nov. 10th,
1853) makes a similar assertion, it
would appear that there must be some
mistake ; though what the mistake is
I know not, as Bechstein at least must
have known the white variety of T.
risoria : it would be an unparalleled
fact if the same two species sometimes
produced extremely fertile, and some-
times extremely barren, offspring. In
the MS. report from the Zoological
Gardens it is said that hybrids from
Turtur vulgaris and suraiensis, and
from T. vulgaris and Ectopistes migra*
torius, were sterile. Two of the latter
male hybrids paired with their pure
parents, viz. Turtur vulgaris and the
Ectopistes, and likewise with T, risoria
and with Columloa cenas, and many
eggs were produced, but all were
barren. At Paris, hybrids have been
raised (Isid. Geoffrey Saint-Hilaire,
‘Hist. Nat. Geherale,’ tom. iii. p. 180)
from Turtur auritus with T. cam-
bayensis and with T. suratensis ; but
nothing is said of their fertility. At
the Zoological Gardens of London the
Goura coronata and victories produced
a hybrid which paired with the pure
G. coronata, and laid several eggs, b;it
these proved barren. In 1860 Columha
gymnophthalmos and maculosa pro-
duced hybrids in these same gardens
204
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
CriAP VI
and Laughers, which likewise do not differ much in any other
character) coo in the same peculiar manner, unlike the voice
of any other wild pigeon. All the coloured breeds display
the same peculiar metallic tints on the breast, a character far
from general with pigeons. Each race presents nearly the
same range of variation in colour ; and in most of the races
wo have the same singular correlation between the develop-
ment of down in the young and the future colour of plumage.
All have the proportional length of their toes, and of their
primary wing-feathers, nearly the same, — characters which
are apt to differ in the several members of the Columbidee.
In those races which present some remarkable deviation of
structure, such as in the tail of Fantails, crop of Pouters, beak
of Carriers and Tumblers, &c., the other parts remain nearly
unaltered. Now every naturalist will admit that it would be
scarcely possible to pick out a dozen natural species in any
family which should agree closely in habits and in general
structure, and yet should differ greatly in a few characters
alone. This fact is explicable through the doctrine of natural
selection ; for each successive modification of structure in each
natural species is preserved, solely because it is of service ;
and such modifications when largely accumulated imply a
great change in the habits of life, and this will almost cer-
tainly lead to other changes of structure throughout the whole
organization. On the other hand, if the several races of the
pigeon have been produced by man through selection and
variation, we can readily understand how it is that they
should still all resemble each other in habits and in those
many characters which man has not cared to modify, whilst
they differ to so prodigious a degree in those parts which
have struck his eye or pleased his fancy.
Besides the points above enumerated, in which all the
domestic races resemble G. Uvia and each other, there is one
which deserves special notice. The wild rock-pigeon is of a
slaty-blue colour ; the wings are crossed by two burs ; the
croup varies in colour, being generally white in the pigeon
of Europe, and blue in that of India ; the tail has a black bar
close to the end, and the outer webs of the outer tail-feathers
are edged with white, except near the tips. These combined
Chap. VI.
THEIR REVERSION IN COLOUR.
205
characters are not found in any wild pigeon besides C. livia.
I have looked carefully through the great collections of
pigeons in the British Museum, and I find that a dark bar at
the end of the tail is common ; that the white edging to the
outer tail-feathers is not rare ; but that the white croup is
extremely rare, and the two black bars on the wings occur in
no other pigeon, excepting the alpine C. leuconota and G.
rupestris of Asia. Now if we turn to the domestic races, it is
highly remarkable, as an eminent fancier, Mr. Wicking,
observed to me, that, whenever a blue bird appears in any
race, the wings almost invariabl}^ show the double black bars.''^^
The primary wing-feathers may be white or black, and the
whole body may be of any colour, but if the wing coverts are
blue, the two black bars are sure to appear. I have mj^self
seen, or acquired trustworthy evidence, as given below,^^ of
There is one exception to the
rule, namely, in a sub-variety of the
Swallow of German origin, which is
figured by Neumeister, and was shown
to me by Mr. Wicking. This bird is
blue, but has not the black wing-bars ;
for our object, however, in tracing the
descent of the chief races, this ex-
ception signifies the less as the Swallow
approaches closely in structure to C.
livia. In many sub-varieties the black
bars are replaced by bars of various
colours. The figures giA’-cu by Neu-
meister are sufficient to shoAv that, if
the wings alone are blue, the black
wing-bars appear.
I have observed blue birds with
all the aboA'e-mentioned marks in the
following races, which seemed to be
perfectly pure, and were shoAvn at
various exhibitions. Pouters, with
the double black wing-bars, with
Avhite croup, dark bar to end of tail,
and white edging to outer tail-feathers.
Turbits,Avith all these same characters.
Fantails with the same ; but the croup
in some tvas bluish or pure blue. Mr.
Wicking bred blue Fantails from two
black birds. Carriers (including the
Bagadotten of Neumeister) with all
the marks : two birds tvhich I ex-
amined had white, and two had blue
croups ; the tvhite edging to the outer
tail-feathers was not present in all.
Mr. Corker, a great breeder, assures
me that, if black carriers are matched
for many successive generations, the
offspring become first ash-coloured,
and then blue with black wing-bars.
Runts of the elongated breed had the
same marks, but the croup was pale
blue ; the outer tail-feathers had
white edges. Neumeister figures the
great Florence Runt of a blue colour
Avith black bars. Jacobins are A^ery
rarely blue, but I have received au-
thentic accounts of at least two in-
stances of the blue variety with black
bars having appeared in England;
blue Jacobins Avere bred by Mr. Brent
from tAVO black birds. I have seen
common Tumblers, both Indian and
English, and Short-faced Tumblers, of
a blue colour, with black wing-bars,
Avith the black bar at the end of the
tail, and Avith the outer tail-feathers
edged Avith white; the croup in all
Avas blue, or extremely pale blue,
never absolutely Avhite. Blue Barbs
and Trumpeters seem to be excessiA'ely
rare ; but Neumeister, Avho may be
implicitly trusted, figures blue A’arie-
ties of both, Avith black wing-bars. Mr.
Brent informs me that he has seen a
200
DOMESTIC TTGEONS *.
Chap. Y1
bhio birds with black bars on tlie wing, with the croup
either white or very pale or dark blue, with the tail having
a terminal black bar, and with the outer feathers externally
edged with white or very pale coloured, in the following races,
which, as I carefully obsoiwed in each case, appeared to bo
perfectly true: namely, in Pouters, Fantails, Tumblers,
Jacobins, Turbits, Barbs, Carriers, Punts of three distinct
varieties. Trumpeters, Swallows, and in many other toy-
pigeons, which as being closely allied to C. lima, are not
worth enumerating. Thus we see that, in purely bred races
of every kind known in Europe, blue birds occasionally appear
having all the marks which characterise G. livia, and which
concur in no other wild species. Mr. Blyth, also, has made
the same observation with respect to the various domestic
races known in India.
Certain variations in the plumage are equally common in
the wild C. livia, in dovecot-pigeons, and in all the most
higliiy modified races. Thus, in all, the croup varies from
white to blue, being most frequently white in Europe, and
very generally blue in India. We have seen that the wild
C. livia in Europe, and dovecots in all parts of the world,
often have the upper wing-coverts chequered with black;
and all the most distinct races, when blue, are occasional!}
chequered in precisely the same manner. Thus I have seen
Pouters, Fantails, Carriers, Turbits, Tumblers (Indian and
English), Swallows, Bald-pates, and other toy-pigedns blue
and cheque: ed ; and Mr. Esquilant has seen a chequered Runt.
I bred from two pure blue Tumblers a chequered bird.
The facts hitherto given refer to the occasional appearance
in pure races of blue birds- with black wing-bars, and likewise
blue Barb ; and Mr, H. Weir, as I am
informed by Mr. Teget i.eier, once
bred a silver (which means very pale
blue) Barb from two yellow birds.
Mr. Blyth informs me that all
the domestic races in India have the
croup blue ; but this is not invariable,
for I possess a very pale blue Simmali
pigeon with the croup perfectly white,
sent to mo by Sir W. Elliot from
Madras. A slaty-blue and chequered
Nakshi pigeon has some white feathers
on the croup alone. In some other
Indian pigeons there were a few white
feathers confined to the croup, and I
have noticed the same fact in a carrier
from Persia. The Java Fantail (im-
ported into Amoy, and thence sent
me) has a perfectly white croup.
Chap. VI.
THEIK REVERSION IN COLOUR.
207
of blue and cbequered birds ; but it will now be seen that
when two birds belonging to distinct races are crossed,
neither of which have, nor probably have had during many
generations, a trace of blue in their plumage, or a trace of
wing-bars and the other characteristic marks, they very
frequently produce mongrel offspring of a blue colour, some-
times chequered, with black wing-bars, &c. ; or if not of a
blue colour, yet with the several characteristic mark s more
or less plainly developed. I was led to investigate this
subject from MM. Boitard and Corbio^^ having asserted that
from crosses between certain breeds it is rare to get anything
but bisets or dovecot pigeons, which, as we know, are blue
birds with the usual characteristic marks. We, shall here-
after see that this subject possesses, independently of our
present object, considerable interest, so that I will give the
results of my own trials in full. I selected for experiment
races which, when pure, very seldom produce birds of a blue
colour, or have bars on their wings and tail.
The Nun is white, with the head, tail, and primary wing-
feathers black ; it is a breed which was established as long-
ago as the year 1600. I crossed a male Nun with a female
red common Tumbler, which latter variety generally breeds
true. Thus neither parent had a trace of blue in the plumage,
or of bars on the wing and tail. I should premise that
common Tumblers are rarely blue in England. From the
above cross I reared several young: one was red over the
whole back, but with the tail as blue as that of the rock-
pigeon ; the terminal bar, however, was absent, but the outer
feathers were edged with white : a second and third nearly
resembled the first, but the tail in both presented a trace of
the bar at the end : a fourth was brownish, and the wings
showed a trace of the double bar : a fifth was pale blue over
the whole breast, back, croup, and tail, but the neck and
primary wing-feathers were reddish; the wings presented
two distinct bars of a red colour ; the tail was not barred, but
the outer feathers were edged with white. I crossed this
last curiously coloured bird with a black mongiel of com-
plicated descent, namely, from a black Barb, a Spot, and
‘ Les Pigeons,’ &c., p. 37.
208
DOMESTIC PIGEONS:
Chap. VI.
Alinond-tiimbler, so that the two young birds produced from
this cross included the bleed of five varieties, none of which
had a trace of blue or of wing and tail-bars : one of the two
young birds was brownish -black, with black wing-bars ; the
other was reddish-dim, with reddish wing-bars, paler than
the rest of the body, with the croup pale blue, the tail bluisli
with a trace of the terminal bar.
Mr. Eaton matched two Short-faced Tumblers, namely, a
splash cock and kite hen (neither of which are blue or barred),
and from the first nest he got a perfect blue bird, and from the
second a silver or pale blue bird, both of which, in accordance
with all analogy, no doubt presented the usual cbaracteristic
marks.
I crossed two male black Barbs with two female red Spots.
These latter have the whole body and wings white, with a
spot on the forehead, tiie tail and tail-coverts red ; the race
existed at least as long ago as 1676, and now breeds perfectly
true, as was known to be the case in the year 1735.'^^ Barbs
are uniformly-coloured birds, with rarely even a trace of bars
on the wing or tail; they are known to breed very true. The
mongrels thus raised were black or nearly black, or dark or
pale brown, sometimes slightly piebald with white ; of these
birds no le> s than six presented double wing-bars ; in two
the bars were conspicuous and quite black ; in seven some
white feathers appeared on the croup ; and in two or three
there was a trace of the terminal bar to the tail, but in none
were the outer tail-feathers edged with white.
I crossed black Barbs (of two excellent strains) with purely-
bred, snow-white Fantails. The mongrels were generally
quite black, with a few of the primary wing and tail feathers
white : others were dark reddish-brown, and others snow-
white : none had a trace of ’ wing-bars or of the white croup.
I then paired together two of these mongrel-^, namely, a
brown and black bird, and their offspring displayed wing-
bars, faint, but of a darker brown than the rest of body. In a
■second brood from the same parents a brown bird was
produced, with several white feathers confined to the croup.
‘Treatise on Pigeons,’ 1858, p. ** J. Moore’s ‘ Columbarium,’ 1 735;
in J. M. Eaton’s edition, 1852, p. 71.
145.
Ghap. YI.
THE IE EE VERSION IN COLOUR.
209
I crossed a male dun Dragon belonging to a family whicli
had been dun-coloured without wing-bars during several
generations, v/ith a uniform red Barb (bred from two black
Barbs) ; and the offspring presented decided but faint traces
of wing-bars. I crossed a uniform red male Eunt with a
White trumpeter ; and the offspring had a slaty-blue tail with
a bar at the end, and with the outer feathers edged with
white. I also crossed a female black and white chequered
Trumpeter (of a different strain from the last) with a male
Almond- tumbler, neither of which exhibited a trace of blue,
or of the white croup, or of the bar at end of tail : nor is- it
probable that the progenitors of these two birds had for
many generations exhibited any of these characters, for I
have never even heard of a blue Trumpeter in this country,
and my Almond-tumbler was purely bred ; yet the tail of this
mongrel was bluish, with a broad black bar at the end, and
the croup was perfectly white. It may be observed in several
of these cases, that the tail first shows a tendency to become
by reversion blue ; and this fact of the persistency of colour in
the tail and tail-coverts will surprise no one who has attended
to the crossing of pigeons.
The last case which I will give is the most curious. I
paired a mongrel female Barb-fantail with a mongrel male
Barb -spot; neither of which mongrels had the least blue
about them. Let it be remembered that blue Barbs are
excessively rare ; that Spots, as has been already stated, were
perfectly characterised in the year 1676, and breed perfectly
true ; this likewise is the case with white Fantails, so much
so that I have never heard of white Fantails throwing any
other colour. Nevertheless the offspring from the above two
mongrels was of exactly the same blue tint as that of the
V, ild rock-pigeon from the Shetland Islands over the whole
I could give numerous examples ;
two will siiffice. A mongrel, whose
four grandparents were a white Turbit,
white Trumpeter, white Fantail, and
blue Pouter, was white all over,
except a very fev/ feathers about the
head and on the wings, hut the w^hole
Uiil and tail-coverts were dark bluish-
15
grey. Another mongrel whose four
grandparents were a red Ruiit, white
Trumpeter, white Fantail, and the
^ame blue Pouter, was pure white tal
over, except the taiP and upper aill-
coverts, which wore pale fawn, and
except the faintest trace of double
wing-bars of the same pale fawn tint
210
DOMESTIC PIGEONS I
Chap, VI
bade and wings ; the double black wing-bars were equally
conspicuous ; the tail was exactly alike in all its characters,
and the croup was pure white ; the head, however, was tinted
with a shade of red, evidently derived from the Spot, and was
of a paler blue than in the rock-pigeon, as was the stomach,
So that two black Barbs, a red Spot, and a white Fantail, as
the four purely- bred grandparents, produced a bird exhibiting
the general blue colour, together with every characteristic
mark, the wild Columha lima.
With respect to crossed breeds frequently producing blue
birds chequered with black, and resembling in all res[)ects
both the dovecot-pigeon and the chequered wild variety of
the rock-pigeon, the statement before referred to by MM.
Boitard and Corbie would almost suffice ; but I will give
three instances of the appearance of such birds from crosses
in which one alone of the parents or great-grandparents was
blue, but not chequered. I crossed a male blue Turbit with a
snow-white Trumpeter, and the following j^'ear with a dark,
leaden-brown, Short-faced Tumbler ; the offspring from the
first cross were as perfectly chequered as an}^ dovecot-pigeon ;
and from the second, so much so as to be nearly as black as
the most darkly chequered rock -pigeon from Madeira. Another
bird, whose great-grandparents were a white Trumpeter, a
white Fantail, a white Eed-spot, a red Eunt, and a blue Pouter,
was slaty-blue and chequered exactly like a dovecot-pigeon.
I may here add a remark made to me V)y Mr. Wicking, who
has had more experience than any other person in England in
breeding pigeons of various colours : namely, that when a blue,
or a blue and chequered bird, having black wing-bars, once
appears in any race and is allow*ed to breed, these eharacters
are so strongly transmitted that it is extremely difficult to
eradicate them.
What, then, are we to conclude from this tendency in all
the chief domestic races, bolh when purely bred and more
especiall}^ when intercrossed, to produce offspring of a blue
colour, with the same char aet eristic marks, varying in the
same manner, as in Columbia livia ? If we admit that these
races are all descended from 0. livia, no breeder will doubt
that the occasional appearance of blue birds thus characterised
CUAP. VI.
THEIR REVERSION IN COLOUR.
211
is accounted for on the well-known principle of “throwing
back ” or reversion. Why crossing should give so strong a
tendency to reversion, we do not with certainty know ; hut
abundant evidence of this fact will be given in the following
chapters. It is probable that I might have bred even for
a century pure black Barbs, Spots, Nuns, white Fantails,
Trumpeters, &c., without obtaining a single blue or barred
bird ; yet by crossing these breeds I reared in the first and
second generation, during the course of only three or four
years, a considerable number of young birds, more or less
plainly coloured blue, and with most of the characteristic
marks. When black and white, or black and red birds, are
crossed, it would appear that a slight tendency exists in both
parents to produce blue offspring, and that this, when com-
bined, overpowers the separate tendeney in either parent to
produce black, or white, or red offspring.
If we rejeet the belief that all the races of the pigeon are
the modified descendants of G. licia, and suppose that they
are deseended from several aboriginal stocks, then we must
choose between the three following assumptions : firstly, that
at least eight or nine species formerly existed which were
aboriginally coloured in various ways, but have since varied
in exactly the same manner so as to assume the eolonring
of C. livia ; but this assumption throws not the least light on
the appearance of such colours and marks when the races are
crossed. Or secondly, we may assume that the aboriginal
species were all coloured blue, and had the wing-bars and
other characteristic marks of C. livia, — a supposition which is
highly improbable, as besides this one speeies no existing
member of the Columbidse presents these combined eha-
racters; and it would not be possible to find any other
instance of several species identical in plumage, yet as
different in important points of structure as are Pouters,
Pan tails, Carriers, Tumblers, &c. Or lastly, we may assume
that all the races, whether descended from C. livia or from
several aboriginal species, although they have been bred
with so much care and are so highly valued by fanciers, have
all been crossed within a dozen or score of generations with
(7. livia, and have thus acquired their tendency to produce
212
DOMESTIC pigeons:
Chap. \ 1
blue birds with the several characteristic marks. I have said
that it must be assumed that each race has been crossed with
C. livia within a dozen, or, at the utmost, within a score ot
generations ; for there is no reason to believe that crossed
offspring ever revert to one of their ancestors when removed
by a greater number of generations. In a breed which has
been crossed only once, the tendency to reversion will
naturally become less and less in the succeeding generations,
as in each there will be less and less of the blood of the
foreign breed ; but when there has been no cross with a
distinct breed, and there is a tendency in both parents to
revert to some long-lost character, this tendency, for all that
we can see to the contrary, may be transmitted undiminished
for an indefinite number of generations. These two distinct
cases of reversion are often confounded together by those
who have written on inheritance.
Considering, on the one hand, the improbability of the
three assumptions which have just been discussed, and, on
the other hand, how simply the facts are explained on the
principle of reversion, we may conclude thal: the occasional
appearance in all the races, both when purely bred and more
especially when crossed, of blue birds, sometimes chequered,
with double wing-bars, with white or blue croups, with a
bar at the end of the tail, and with the outer tail-feathers
edged with white, affords an argument of the greatest weight
in favour of the view that all are descended from Golumba livia,
including under this name the three or four wild varieties or
sub-species before enumerated.
To sum up the six foregoing arguments, which are opposed
to the belief that the chief domestic races are the descendants
of at least eight or nine or perhaps a dozen species ; for the
crossing of any less number would not yield the characteristic
differences between the several races. Firstly, the impi’oba-
bility that so many species should still exist somewhere, but
be unknown to ornithologists, or that they should have
become within the historical period extinct, although man
has had so little influence in exterminating the wild G. livia.
Secondly, the improbability of man in former times having
thoroughly domesticated and rendered fertile under confine-
Chap. VL
THEIR REVERSION IN COLOUR.
213
ment so many species. Thirdly, these supposed species having
nowhere become feral. Fourthly, the extraordinary fact that
man should, intentionally or by chance, have chosen for
domestication several species, extremely abnormal in cha-
racter; and furthermore, the points of structure which
render these supposed species so abnormal being now highly
variable. Fifthly, the fact of all the races, though diHering
ill many important points of structure, ]iroducing perfectly
fertile mongrels ; whilst all the hybrids which have been
produced between even closely allied species in the pigeon-
family are sterile. Sixthly, the remarkable statements just
given on the tendency in all the races, both when purely
bred and when crossed, to revert in numerous minute details
of colouring to the character of the wild rock-pigeon, and to
vary in a similar manner. To these arguments may be
added the extreme improbability that a number of species
formerly existed, which differed greatly from each other in
some few points, but which resembled each other as closely
as do the domestic races in other points of structure, in
voice, and in all their habits of life. When these several
facts and arguments are fairly taken into consideration, it.
would require an overwhelming amount of evidence to make
us admit that the chief domestic races are descended from
several aboriginal stocks; and of such evidence there is
absolutely none.
The belief that the chief domestic races are descended from
several wild stocks no doubt has arisen from the apparent
improbability of such great modifications of structure having
been effected since man first domesticated the rock-pigeon.
Nor am I surprised at any degree of hesitation in admitting
their common parentage: formerly, when I went into my
aviaries and watched such birds as Pouters, Carriers, Barbs,
Fan tails, and Short-faced Tumblers, &c., I could not persuade
myself that all had descended from the same wild stock,
and that man had consequently in one sense created these
remarkable modifications. Therefore I have argued the
question of their origin at great, and, as some will think,
superfluous length.
Finally, in favour of the belief that all the races are
214
DOMESTIC pigeons:
CllAl- VI
descended from a single stock, we have in Columha livia a
still existing and widely distributed species, which can he
and has been domesticated in various countries. This species
agrees in most points of structure and in all its habits of
life, as well as occasionally in every detail of plumage, with
the several domestic races. It breeds freely with them, and
produces fertile offspring. It varies in a state of nature,^^
and still more so when semi-domesticated, as shown by
comparing the Sierra Leone pigeons with those of India, or
with those which apparently have run wild in Madeira. It
has undergone a still greater amount of variation in the case
of the numerous toy-pigeons, which no one supposes to be
descended from distinct species ; yet some of these toy-
pigeons have transmitted their character truly for centuries.
Why, then, should we hesitate to believe in tliat greater
amount of variation which is necessary for the production of
the eleven chief races ? It should be borne in mind that in
two of the most strongly-marked races, namely. Carriers and
Short-faced . Tumblers, the extreme forms can be connected
with the parent-species by graduated differences not greater
than those which may be observed between the dovecot-
pigeons inhabiting different countries, or between the various
kinds of toy-pigeons, — gradations which must certainly be
attributed to variation.
That circumstances have been eminently favourable for
the modification of the pigeon through variation and selec-
tion will now be shown. The earliest record, as has been
pointed out to me by Professor Lepsius, of pigeons in a
domesticated condition, occurs in the fifth Egj^ptian dynasty,
about 3000 b.c. but Mr. Birch, of the British Museum,
informs me that the pigeon appears in a bill of fai'e in the
previous dynasty. Domestic pigeons are mentioned in
Genesis, Leviticus, and Isaiah. In the time of the Eomans,
It deserves notice, as bearing on
the general subject of variation, that
not only G. livia presents several wild
forms, regarded by some naturalists as
species and by others as sub-species or
as mere varieties, but that the species
of several allied genera are in the same
predicamvjnt. This is the case, as ]\Ir.
Blyth has remarked to me, with
Treron, Palumbus, and Turtur.
31 ‘ Denkmaler,’ Abth. ii. Bl. 70.
33 The ‘ Dovecote,’ by the Rev. E. S.
Dixon, 1851, pp. 11-13. Adolphe
Pictet (in his ‘ Les Origincs Indo'
Chap. VL
rOKMATION OF RACES.
215
as we hear from Pliny, immense prices were given for
pigeons ; “ na,y, they are come to this pass, that they can
reckon np their pedigree and race.” In India, about the
year 1600, pigeons were much valued by Akber Khan :
20,000 birds were carried about with the court, and the
merchants brought valuable collections. “ The monarch of
Iran and Turan sent him some very rare breeds. His
Majesty,” says the courtly historian, “ by crossing the breeds,
which method was never practised before, has improved them
astonishingly.” Akber Khan possessed seventeen distinct
kinds, eight of which were valuable for beauty alone. At
about this same period of 1600 the Dutch, according to
Aldrovandi, were as eager about pigeons as the Eomans had
formerly been. The breeds which were kept during the
fifteenth century in Europe and in India apparently differed
from each other. Tavernier, in his Travels in 1677, speaks,
as does Chardin in 1735, of the vast number of pigeon-
houses in Persia ; and the former remarks that, as Christians
were not permitted to keep pigeons, some of the vulgar
actually turned Mahometans for this sole purpose, d'he
Emperor of Morocco had his favourite keeper of pigeons, as
is mentioned in Moore’s treatise, published 1737. In England,
from the time of W illughby in 1678 to the present day, as
well as in Germany and in France, numerous treatises have
been published on the pigeon. In India, about a hundred
years ago, a Persian treatise was written ; and the writer
thought it no light affair, for he begins with a solemn in-
vocation, “ in the name of God, the gracious and merciful.”
Many large towns, in Europe and the United States, now
have their societies of devoted pigeon- fanciers ; at present
there are three such societies in London. In India, as I hear
from Mr. Blyth, the inhabitants of Delhi and of some other
great cities are eager fanciers. Mr. Layard informs me
Eui-opeennes,’ 1859, p. .399) states
that there are in the ancient Sanscrit
language between 25 and 30 names
for the pigeon, and other 15 or l6
Persian names ; none of these are com-
mon to the European languages. This
fact indicates the antiquity of the
domestication of the pigeon in the
East.
English translation, 1601, Book
X. ch. xxxvii.
‘Ayeen Akbery,’ translated I j
F. Gladwin, 4to edit., vol. i. p. 270.
216
DOMESTIC PIGEONS :
CiiAi>. VL
that most of the known breeds are kept in Ceylon. In
China, according to Mr. Swinhoe of Amoy, and Dr. Lockhart
of Shangai, Carriers, Fantails, Tumblers, and other varietifea
are reared with care, especially by the bonzes or priests.
The Chinese fasten a kind of whistle to the tail-feathers of
their pigeons, and as the flock wheels through the air they
produce a sweet sound. In Egypt the late Abbas Pacha was
a great fancier of Eantails. Many pigeons are kept at Cairo
and Constantinople, and these have lately been imported by
native merchants, as I hear from Sir W. Elliot, into Southern
India, and sold at high prices.
The foregoing statements show in how many countries,
and during how long a period, many men have been passion-
ately devoted to the breeding of pigeons. Hear how an
enthusiastic fancier at the present day writes : “If it were
possible for noblemen and gentlemen to know the amazing
amount of solace and pleasure derived from Almond Tumblers,
when they begin to understand their properties, I should
think that scarce any nobleman or gentleman would be
without their aviaries of Almond Tumblers.” The pleasure
thus taken is of paramount importance, as it leads amateurs
carefully to note and preserve each slight deviation of
structure which strikes their fancy. Pigeons are often
closely confined during their whole lives ; they do not
partake of their naturally varied diet ; they have often been
transported from one climate to another; and all these
changes in their conditions of life would be likely to cause
variability. Pigeons have been domesticated for nearly
5000 years, and have been kept in many places, so that the
numbers reared under domestication must have been enor-
mous : and this is another circumstance of high importance,
for it obviously favours the chance of rare modifications of
structure occasionally appearing. Slight variations of all
kinds would almost certainly be observed, and, if valued,
would, owing to the following circumstances, be preserved
and propagated with unusual facility. Pigeons, difierently
from any other domesticated animal, can easily be mated foi
** J M I^iton, ‘Treatise on the Almond Tumbler,’ 1851 ; Preface, p. vL
Cpiap. YI. HISTOEY OF THE PRINCIPAL RACES.
217
life, and, thougli kept with other pigeons, rarely prove un-
faithful to each other. Even w^hen the male does break his
marriage-vow, he does not permanently desert his mate. I
have bred in the same aviaries many pigeons of different
kinds, and never reared a single bird of an impure strain.
Hence a fancier can with the greatest ease select and
match his birds. He will also see the good results of his
care; for pigeons breed with extraordinary rapidity. He
may freely reject inferior birds, as they serve at an early
age as excellent food.
History of the piincipal Maces of the Pigeon.^^
Before discussing the means and steps by which the chief races
have been formed, it will be advisable to give some historical details,
for more is known of the history of the pigeon, little though this is,
than of any other domesticated animal. Some of the cases are inter-
esting as proving how long domestic varieties may be propagated
with exactly the same or nearly the same characters; and other
cases are still more interesting as showing how slowly but steadily
races have been greatly modified during successive generations. In
the last chapter I stated that Trumpeters and Laughers, both
so remarkable for their voices, seem to have been perfectly charac-
terised in 1735 ; and Laughers were apparently known in India
before the year 16C0. Spots in 1676, and Nuns in the time of
Aldrovandi, before 1600, were coloured exactly as they now are.
Common Tumblers and Ground Tumblers displayed in India, before
the year 1600, the same extraordinary peculiarities of flight as at
the present day, for they are well described in the ‘ Ayeen Akbery.’
These breeds may all have existed for a much longer period ; we
know only that they were perfectly characterised at the dates above
given. The average length of life of the domestic pigeon is probably
about five or six years ; if so, some of these races have retained
their character perfectly for at least forty or fifty generations.
Pouters. — These birds, as far as a very short description serves for
comparison, appear to have been well characterised in Aldrovandi’s
time,^^ before the year 1600. Length of body and length of leg are
at the present time the two chief points of excellence. In 1735
Moore said (see Mr. J. M. Eatons edition) — and Moore was a first-
rate fancier — that he once saw a bird with a body 20 inches in
length, “ though 17 or 18 inches is reckoned a very good length and
he has seen the legs very nearly 7 inches in length, yet a leg6| or 6|
long “ must be allowed to be a very good one.” Mr. Bult, the most
As in the following discussion I completed in the year 1858.
often speak of the present time, I ‘ Ornithologie,’ 1600, voi. ii. p.
should state that this chapter was 360.
218
DOMESTIC pigeons:
Chai>. VI.
successful breeder of Pouters in the world, informs me that at
present (1858) the standard length of the body is not less than 18
inches; but he has measured one bird 19 inches in length, and has
heard of 20 and 22 inches, but doubts the truth of these latter
statements. The standard length of the leg is now 7 inches, but
Mr. Bult has recently measured two of his own birds with legs Ts
long. So that in the 123 years which have elapsed since 1735 there
has been hardly any increase in the standard length of the body ;
17 or 18 inches was formerly reckoned a very good length, and
now 18 inches is the minimum standard ; but the length of leg
seems to have increased, as Moore never saw one quite 7 inches
long ; now the standard is 7, and two of Mr Buit’s birds measured
7s inches in length. The extremely slight improvement in Pouters,
except in the length of the leg, during the last 123 years, may bo
partly accounted for by the neglect which they suffered, as I am
informed by Mr. Bult, until within the last 20 or 30 years. About
1765^^ there was a change of fashion, stouter and more feathered
legs being preferred to thin and nearly naked legs.
Fantaih, — The first notice of the existence of this breed is in
India, before the year 1600, as given in the 'Ayeen Akbery;’^® at tliis
date, judging from Aldrovandi, the breed was unknown in Europe.
In 1677 Willughby speaks of a Fantail with 26 tail-feathers ; in 1735
Moore saw one with 36 feathers ; and in 1821: MM. Boitard and
Corbie assert that in France birds can easily be found with 42 tail-
feathers. In England, the number of the tail-feathers is not at
present so much regarded as their upward direction and expansion.
The general carriage of the bird is likewise now much valued. The
old descriptions do not suffice to show whether in these latter
respects there has been much improvement : but if Fantails with
their heads and tails touching had formerly existed, as at the present
time, the fact would almost certainly have been noticed. The
Fantails which are now found in India probably show the state of
the race, as far as carriage is concerned, at the date of their intro-
duction into Europe ; and some, said to have been brought from
Calcutta, which I kept alive, were in a marked manner inferior to
our exhibition birds. The Java Fantail shows the same difference
in carriage ; and although Mr. Swinhoe has counted 18 and 24 tail-
feathers in his birds, a first-rate specimen sent to me had only
14 tail-feathers.
Jacobins. — This breed existed before 1600, but the hood, judging
from the figure given by Aldrovandi, did not enclose the head
nearly so perfectly as at present : nor was the head then white ;
nor were the wings and tail so long, but this last character might
have been overlooked by the rude artist. In Moore’s time, in 1735, the
Jacobin was considered the smallest kind of pigeon, and the bill is
‘ A Treatise on Domestic of part of the ‘ Ayeen Akbery ’ ir
Pigeons,’ dedicate 1 to Mr. Mayor, ‘ Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist vol
17(35. Preface, p. xiv. xix. 18-17, p. 104.
Mr. Blyth has given a translation
Chap. YI.
HISTORY OF THE PRINCIPAL RACES.
219
said to be very short. Hence either the Jacobin, or the other kinds
with which it was then compared, mnst since that time have been
considerably modified; for Moore’s description (and it must be
remembered that he was a first-rate judge) is clearly not applicable,
as far as size of body and length of beak are concerned, to our present
Jacobins. In 1795, juging from Bechstein, the breed had assumed
its present character.
Turbits. — It has generally been supposed by the older writers on
pigeons, that the Turbit is the Cortbeck of Aldrovandi ; but if this
be the case, it is an extraordinary fact that the characteristic frill
should not have been noticed. The beak, moreover, of the Gortbeck
is described as closely resembling that of the Jacobin, which shows
a change in the one or the other race. The Turbit, with its charac-
teristic frill, andbearingits present name, is described by Willughby
in 1677 ; and the bill is said to be like that of the bullfinch, — a good
comparison, but now more strictly applicable to the beak of the
Barb. The sub-breed called the Owl was v/ell known in Moore’s
time, in 1735,
Tumblers— CommoiL Tumblers, as well as Ground Tumblers, perfect
as far as tumbling is concerned, existed in India before the year
1600 ; and at this period diversified modes of flight, such as flying
at night, the ascent to a great height, and manner of descent, seem
to have been much attended to in India, as at the present time.
Belon in 1555 saw in Paphlagonia what he describes as “ a very
new thing, viz. pigeons which flew so high in the air that they were
lost to view, but returned to their pigeon-house without separating.”
This manner of flight is characteristic of our present Tumblers, but
it is clear that Belon would have mentioned the act of tumbling if
the pigeons described by him had tumbled. Tumblers were not
known in Europe in 1600, as they are not mentioned by Aldrovandi,
who discusses the flight of pigeons. They are briefly alluded to by
Willughby, in 1687, as small pigeons “ which show like footballs in
the air.” The short -faced race did not exist at this period, as
Willughby could not have overlooked birds so remarkable for their
small size and short beaks. We can even trace some of the steps
by which this race has been produced. Moore in 1735 enumerates
correctly the chief points of excellence, hut does not give any de-
scription of the several sub-breeds ; and from this' fact Mr. Eaton
infers that the Short-faced Tumbler had not then come to full
perfection. Moore even speaks of the Jacobin as being the smallest
pigeon. Thirty years afterwards, in 1765, in the Treatise dedicated
to Mayor, short-faced Almond Tumblers are fully described, but the
author, an excellent fancier, expressly states in his Preface (p. xiv.)
that, from great care and expense in breeding them, they have
arrived to so great perfection and are so different from what they
were 20 or 30 years past, that an old fancier would have condemned
‘Treat'se on Pigeons,’ 1852, p.
64.
‘L’Histoire de la Nature des
Oiseaux,’ p. 314.
220
DOMESTIC riGEONS:
Chap. VI,
them for no other reason tlian because they are not like what used
to be thought good when he was in the fancy before.” Hence it
would appear that there was a rather sudden change in the character
of the short-faced Tumbler at about this period ; and there is reason
to suspect that a dwarfed and half-monstrous bird, the parent-form
of the several short-faced sub-breeds, then appeared. I suspect
this because short-faced Tumblers are born with their beaks
(ascertained by careful measurement) as short, proportionally with
the size of their bodies, as in the adult bird ; and in this respect
they differ greatly from all other breeds, which slowly acquire during
growth their various characteristic qualities.
Since the year 1765 there has been some change in one of the
chief characters of the short-faced Tumbler, namely, in the length
of the beak. Fanciers measure the head and beak” from the tip
of the beak to the front corner of the eyeball. About the year 1765
a “ head and beak” was considered good,^^ which, measured in the
usual manner, was ^ of an inch in length ; now it ought not to
exceed f of an inch ; “ it is however possible,” as Mr. Eaton candidly
confesses, “ for a bird to be considered as pleasant or neat even at f
of an inch, but exceeding that length it must be looked upon as
unworthy of attention.” Mr. Eaton states that he has never seen
in the course of his life more than two or three birds with the ‘‘ head
and beak” not exceeding half an inch in length ; still I believe in
tlie course of a few years that the head and beak will be shortened,
and that half-inch birds will not be considered so great a curiosity
as at the present time.” That Mr. Eaton’s opinion deserves attention
cannot be doubted, considering his success in winning prizes at our
exhibitions. Finally in regard to the Tumbler it may be concluded
from the facts above given that it was originally introduced into
Europe, probably first into England, from the East ; and that it
then resembled our common English Tumbler, or more probably
the Persian or Indian Tumbler, with a beak only just perceptibly
shorter than that of the common dovecot-pigeon. With respect to
the short-faced Tumbler, which is not known to exist in the East,
there can hardly be a doubt that the whole wonderful change in the
size- of the head, beak, body and feet, and in general carriage, has
been produced during the last two centuries by continued selection,
aided probably by the birth of a semi-monstrous bird somewhere
about the year 1750.
limits. — Of their history little can be said. In the time of Pliny
the pigeons of Campania were the largest known ; and from this
fact alone some authors assert that they were Runts. In Aldrovandi’s
time, in 1600, two sub-breeds existed ; but one of them, the short-
beaked, is now extinct in Europe.
Barbs. — Notwithstanding statements to the contrary, it seems to
me impossible to recognise the Barb in Aldrovandi’s description and
J. M. Eaton’s ‘Treatise on the Tumbler,’ 1851. Compart p. v ofPr©-
Breeding and Managing of the Almond face, p. 9, and p. 82.
CiiAt*. VI. HISTOKY OF THE PRINCIPAL RACES.
221
figures; four breeds, however, existed in the year 1600 which
evidently were allied both to Barbs and Carriers. To show how
difficult it is to recognise some of the breeds described by Aldrovandi
I will give the different opinions in regard to the above four kinds,
named by him C. indica, cretnisis,gutturosa, and persica, Willughby,
thought that the Colamha indica was a Turbit, but the eminent
fancier Mr. Brent believes that it was an inferior Barb : G. cretensi^,
with a short beak and a swelling on the upper mandible, cannot ba
recognised : C. (falsely called) gutturosa, which from its rostrum,
breve, crassum, et tuberosum seems to me to come nearest to the Barb,
Mr. Brent believes to be a Carrier ; and lastly, the C. persica et
turcica, Mr. Brent thinks, and I quite concur with him, was a short-
beaked Carrier with very little wattle. In 1687 the Barb was known
in England, and Willughby describes the beak as like that of the
Turbit; but it is not credible that his Barbs should have had a beak
like that of our present birds, for so accurate an observer could not
have overlooked its great breadth.
English Carrier. — We may look in vain in Aldrovandi’s work for
any bird resembling our prize Carriers ; the C. persica et turcica of
this author comes the nearest, but is said to have had a short thick
beak ; therefore it must have approached in character a Barb, and
have differed greatly from our Carriers. In Willughby’s time, in
1677, we can clearly recognise the Carrier, yet he adds, the bill is
not short, but of a moderate length a description which no one
would apply to our present Carriers, so conspicuous for the extra-
ordinary length of their beaks. The old names given in Europe to
the Carrier, and the several names now in use in India, indicate
that Carriers originally came from Persia; and Willughby’s de-
scription would perfectly apply to the Bussorah Carrier as it now
exists in Madras. In later times we can partially trace the progress
of change in our English Carriers : Moore, in 1735, says an inch and
a half is reckoned a long beak, though there are very good Carriers
that are found not to exceed an inch and a quarter.” These birds
must have resembled or perhaps been a little superior to the Carriers,
previously described, now found in Persia. In England at the
present day ‘‘ there are,” as Mr. Eaton states, '' beaks that would
measure (from edge of eye to tip of beak) one inch and three-quarters,
and some few even two inches in length.”
From these historical details we see that nearly all the
chief domestic races existed before the year 1600. Some
remarkable only for colour appear to have been identical with
our present breeds, some w^ere nearly the same, some con-
siderably different, and some have since become extinct.
Several breeds, such as Finnikins and Turners, the swallow-
tailed pigeon of Bechstein and the Carmelite, seem to have
‘ Treatise on Pigeons,’ 1852, p. 41.
222
DOMESTIC PIGEONS ;
Chat*. VL
originated and to have disappeared within this same period.
Any one now visiting a well-stocked English aviary would
certainly pick out as the most distinct kinds, the massive Eunt,
tlie Carrier with its wonderfully elongated beak and great
wattles, the Barb with its short broad beak and eye-wattles,
the short-faced Tumbler with its small conical beak, the
Pouter with its great crop, long legs and body, the Fantail
with its upraised, widely-expanded, well- feathered tail, the
d'urbit with its frill and short blunt beak, and the Jacobin
with his hood. Now, if this same person could have viewed
the pigeons kept before 1600 by Akber Khan in India and
by Aldrovandi in Europe, he would have seen the Jacobin
with a less perfect hood ; the Turbit apparently without its
frill ; the Pouter with shorter legs, and in every way less
remarkable — that is, if Aldrovandi’s Pouter resembled the old
German kind ; the Fantail would have been far less singular
in appearance, and would have had much fewer feathers in its
tail ; he would have seen excellent hying Tumblers, but he
would in vain have looked for the marvellous short-faced
breeds ; he would have seen birds allied to Barbs, but it is
extremely doubtful whether he would have met with our
actual Barbs ; and lastly, he would have found Carriers with
beaks and wattle incomparably less developed than in our
English Carriers. He might have classed most of the breeds
in the same groups as at present ; but the differences between
the groups were then far less strongly pronounced than at
present. In short, the several breeds had at this early period
not diverged in so great a degree as now from their aboriginal
common parent, the wild rock -pigeon.
Manner of Formation of the chief Maces.
We will now consider more closely the probable steps by
which the chief races have been formed. As long as pigeons
are kept semi-domesticated in dovecots in their native country,
without any 3are in selecting and matching them, they are
liable to little more variation than the wild C. livia, namely,
in the wings becoming chequered with black, in the croup
being blue or white, and in the size of the body. When,
however, dovecot -pigeons are transported into diversified
Ch\p VI.
MANNER OF FORMATION OF RACES.
223
countries, such as Sierra Leone, the Halay archipelago, and
Madeira, they are exposed to new conditions of life ; and
apparently in consequence vary in a somewhat greater degree.
When closely confined, either for the pleasure of watching
them, or to prevent their straying, they must he exposed,
even in their native climate, to considerably different con-
ditions; for they cannot obtain their natural diversity of
food; and, what is probably more important, they are
abundantly fed, whilst debarred from taking'lnuch exercise.
Under those circumstances we might expect to find, from the
analogy of all other domesticated animals, a greater amount
of individual variability than with the wild pigeon ; and this
is the case. The want of exercise apparently tends to reduce
the size of the feet and organs of flight ; and then, from the
law of correlation of growth, the beak apparently becomes
affected. From what we now see occasionally taking place in
our aviaries, we may conclude that sudden variations or
sports, such as the appearance of a crest of feathers on the
head, of feathered feet, of a new shade of colour, of an addi-
tional feather in the tail or wing, would occur at rare intervals
during the many centuries which have elapsed since the pigeon
was first domesticated. At the present day such “ sports ”
are generally rejected as blemishes ; and there is so much
mystery in the breeding of pigeons that, if a valuable sport
did occur, its history would often be concealed. Before the
last hundred and fifty years, there is hardly a chance of the
history of any such sport having been recorded. But it by
no means follows from this that such sports in former times,
when the pigeon had undergone much less variation, would
have been rejected. We are profoundly ignorant of the cause
of each sudden and apparently spontaneous variation, as well
as of the infinitely numerous shades of difference between the
birds of the same family. But in a future chapter we shall
see that all such variations appear to be the indirect result of
changes of some kind in the conditions of life.
Hence, after a long course of domestication, we might
expect to see in the pigeon much individual variability, and
occasional sudden variations, as well as slight modifications
firom the lessened use of certain parts, together with the
224
DOMESTIC pigeons:
Chap. VI
effects of correlation of growth. But without selection all
this would produce only a trifling or no result ; for without
such aid differences of all kinds would, from the two following
causes, soon disappear. In a healthy and vigorous lot of
pigeons many more young birds are killed for food or die than
are reared to maturity ; so that an individual having any
peculiar character, if not selected, would run a good chance of
being destroyed ; and if not destroyed, the peculiarity in
question would generally be obliterated by free intercrossing.
It might, however, occasionally happen that the same varia-
tion repeatedly occurred, owing to the action of peculiar and
uniform conditions of life, and in this case it would prevail
independently of selection. But when selection is brought
into play all is changed ; for this is the foundation-stone in
the formation of new races ; and with the pigeon, circum-
stances, as we have already seen, are eminently favourable for
selection. When a bird presenting some conspicuous vari-
ation has been preserved, and its offspring have been selected,
carefully matched, and again propagated, and so onwards
during successive generations, the principle is so obvious that
nothing more need be said about it. This may be called
methodical selection, for the breeder has a distinct object in
view, namely, to preserve some character which has actually
appeared ; or to create some improvement already pictured in
his mind.
Another form of selection has hardly been noticed by those
authors who have discussed this subject, but is even more im-
portant. This form may be called unconscious selection, for
the breeder selects his birds unconsciously, unintentionally,
and without method, yet he surely though slowly produces a
great result. I refer to the effects which follow from each
fancier at first procuring' and afterwards rearing as good birds
as he can, according to his skill, and according to the standard
of excellence at each successive period. He does not wish
permanently to modify the breed ; he does not look to the
distant future, or speculate on the final result of the slow
accumulation during many generations of successive slight
chauges ; he is content if he possesses a good stock, and more
than content if he can beat his rivals. The fancier in the
Cha>. VI.
MANNER OF FORMATION OF RACES.
225
lime of Aldrovaiidi, when in the year IGOO he admired his
own Jacobins, Pouters, or Carriers, never reflected what their
descendants in the year 1860 would become : he would haN e
been astonished could he have seen our Jacobins, our improved
English Carriers, and our Pouters ; he would probabl}^ have
denied that they were the descendants of his own once-
admired stock, and he would perhaps not have valued
them, for no other reason,- as was written in 1765, “than
because they were not like what used to be_ thoughC^ood
when ho was in the fancy.” No one will attribute the
lengthened beak of the Carrier, the shortened beak of the
Short-faced Tumbler, the lengthened leg of the Pouter, the
more perfectly enclosed hood of the Jacobin, (^c.,— changes
effected since the time of Aldrovandi, or even since a much
later period, — to the direct and immediate action of the con-
ditions of life. Eor these several races have been modified in
various and even in directly opposite ways, though kept
under the same climate and treated in all respects in as nearly
uniform a manner as possible. Each slight change in the
length or shortness of the beak, in the length of leg, &(?., has
no doubt been indirectly and remotely caused by some change
in the conditions to which the bird has been subjected, but
we must attribute the final result, as is manifest in those
cases of which we have any historical record, to the con-
tinued selection and accumulation of many slight successive
variations.
The action of unconscious selection, as far as pigeons are
concerned, depends on a universal principle in human nature,
namely, on our rivalry, and desire to outdo our neighbours.
We see this in every fleeting fashion, even in our dress, and
it leads the fancier to endeavour to exaggerate' every pecu-
liarity in his breeds. A great authority on pigeons,^^ says,
“ Fanciers do not and will not admire a medium standard,
that is, half and half, which is neither here nor there, but
admire extremes.” After remarking that the fancier of Short-
faced Beard Tumblers wishes for a very short beak, and that
tiie fancier of Long-faced Beard Tumblers wishes for a very
*'* Eaton’s ‘Treatise on Pigeons,’ 1858, p. 86.
16
DOMESTIC no EONS.
Chap. Vi
22(5
long beak, lie sa3 S, with respect to one of intermediate length,
“ Don’t deceive yonrselr. Do you suppose for a moment the
short or the long-faced fancier would accept such a bird as a
gift 7 Certainl}^ not; the short-faced fancier could see no
lx;apity in it ; the long-faced fancier would swear there was
no use in it, itc.” In these comical passages, written seriously,
we see the principle which has ever guided fanciers, and has
led to such great modifications in all the domestic races which
are valued solely for tlieir beauty or curiosity.
Fashions in pigeon-breeding endure for long periods ; we
cannot change the structure of a bird as quickly as we can the
fashion of our dress. In the time of Aldrovandi, no doubt
the more the pouter inflated his crop, the more he was valued.
Nevertheless, fashions do to a certain extent change ; first one
point of strnctpire and then another is attended to; or different
breeds are admired at different times and in different coun-
tries. As the author just quoted remarks, “ the fancy ebbs
and flows ; a thorough fancier now-a-days never stoops to
breed toy-birds ; ” yet these very “ffoys ” are now most care-
fully bred in Germany. Breeds which at the present time
are highly valued in India are considered worthless in England.
No doubt, when breeds are neglected, they degenerate ; still
we may believe that, as long as they are kept under the same
conditions of life, characters once gained will be partially
retained for a long time, and may form the starting-point for
a future course of selection.
Let it not be objected to this view of the action of uncon-
scious selection that fanciers would not observe or care for
extremely" slight differences. Those alone who have associated
with fanciers, can be thoroughly aware of their accurate
powers of discrimination acquired by long practice, and of the
care and labour which they bestow on their birds. I have
known a fancier deliberately study his birds day after day to
settle which to match together and which to reject. Observe
how difficult the subject appears to one of the most eminent
and experienced fanciers. Mr. Eaton, the winner of many
prizes, says, “ I would here particularly guard you against
keeping too great a variety of pigeons, <?therwise you will
know a little about all the kinds, but nothing about one as it
Chap. VI.
MANNER OF FORMATION OF RACES.
227
ought to be known.” . “ It is possible there may be a few
fanciers that have a good general knowledge of the several
fancy pigeons, but there are many who labour under the
delusion of supposing they know what they do not.” Speaking
exclusively of one sub-variety of one race, namely, the short-
faced almond tumbler, and after saying that some fanciers
sacrifice every property to obtain a good head and beak, and
that other fanciers sacrifice everything for plumage, he
remarks : “ Some young fanciers who are over covetous go in
for all the five properties at once, and they have their reward
by getting nothing.” In India, as I hear from Mr. Blyth,
pigeons are likewise selected and matched with the greatest
care. We must not judge of the slight divergences from
existing varieties which would have been valued in ancient
days, by those which are now valued after the formation of so
many races, each with its own standard of perfection, kept
uniform by our numerous Exhibitions. The ambition of the
most energetic fancier may be fully satisfied by the difficulty
of excelling other fanciers in the breeds already established,
without trying to form a new one.
A difficulty with respect to the power of selection will
perhaps already have occurred to the reader, namely, what
could have led fanciers first to attempt to make such singular
breeds as Pouters, Eantails, Carriers, &c. ? But it is this very
difficulty which the principle of unconscious selection re-
moves. Undoubtedly no fancier ever did intentionally make
such an attempt. All that we need suppose is that a
variation occurred sufficiently marked to catch the dis-
criminating eye of some ancient fancier, and then unconscious
selection carried on for many generations, that is, the wish
of succeeding fanciers to excel their rivals, would do the
rest. In the case of the Fantail we may suppose that the
first progenitor of the breed had a tail only slightly erected,
as may now be seen in certain Runts,^^ with some increase in
the number of the tail-feathers, as now occasionally occurs
with Nuns. In the case of the Pouter we may suppose that
45 See Neumeister’s figure of the Florence Runt, tab. 13, in ‘ Das Ganze der
Taubenzueht.’
22S
DOMESTIC PIGEONS.
Chap. VI.
some bird inflated its crop a little more than other pigeons,
as is now the case in a slight degree with the oesophagus of
the Turbit. We do not know the origin of the common
Tumbler, but we may suppose that a bird was born with
some affection of the brain, leading it to make somersaults in
the air;^** and before the year 1600 pigeons remarkable for
their diversified manner of flight were much valued in India,
and by the order of the Emperor Akber Khan were sedulously
trained and carefully matched.
Ill the foregoing cases we have supposed that a sudden
variation, conspicuous enough to catch a fancier’s eye, first
appeared ; but even this degree of abruptness in the process
of variation is not necessary for the formation of a new breed.
When the same kind of pigeon has been kept pure, and has
been bred during a long period by. two or more fanciers,
slight differences in the strain can often be recognized.
Thus I have seen first-rate Jacobins in one man’s possession
which certainly differed slightly in several characters from
those kept by another. I possessed some excellent Barbs
descended from a pair which had won a prize, and another
lot descended from a stock formerly kept by that famous
fancier Sir John Sebright, and these plainly differed in the
form of the beak ; but the differences were so slight that
they could hardly be given by words. Again, the com-
mon English and Dutch Tumbler differ in a somewhat
greater degree, both in length of beak and shape of head.
What first caused these slight differences cannot be explained
any more than why one man has a long nose and another a
short one. In the strains long kept distinct by different
fanciers, such differences are so common that they cannot bo
accounted for by the accident of the birds first chosen for
breeding having been originally as different as they now are.
The explanation no doubt lies in selection of a slightly
different nature having been applied in each case; for no
46 Mr. W. J. Moore gives a full nine, to an ordinary pigeon, brings on
account of tlie Ground Tumblers of convulsive movements exactly like
India (‘ Indian Medical Gazette,’ Jan. those of a Tumbler. One pigeon,
and Feb., 1873 j, and says the pricking the brain of which had been pricked,
the base of the brain, and giving hy- completely recovered, and ever after-
drocyanic acid, together with strych- wards occasionally made somersaults.
ClIAl* VI,
MANNER OF FORMATION OF RACES.
229
two fanciers have exactly the same taste, and consequently
110 two, in choosing and carefully matching their birds,
prefer or select exactly the same. As each man naturally
admires his own birds, he goes on continually exaggerating
by selection whatever slight peculiarities they ina}’- possess.
This will more especially happen with fanciers living in
different countries, who do not compare their stocks or aim
at a common standard of perfection. Thus, when a mere
strain has once been formed, unconscious selection steadily
tends to augment the amount of difference, and thus converts
the strain into a snb-breed and this ultimately into a wtdl-
marked breed or race.
The principle of correlation of growth should never be lost
sight of. Most pigeons have small feet, apparently caused
by their lessened use, and from correlation, as it would
appear, their beaks have likewise bec.mie reduced in length.
The beak is a conspicuous organ, and, as soon as it had thus
become perceptibly shortened, fanciers would almost certainly
strive to reduce it still more by the continued selection of
birds with the shortest beaks ; whilst at the same time other
fanciers, as we know has actually been the case, would in
other sub-breeds, strive to increase its length. With the
increased length of the beak, the tongue becomes greatly
lengthened, as do the eyelids with the increased development
of the eye-wattles ; with the reduced or increased size of the
feet, tlie number of the scutellae vary; with the length of the
wing, the number of the primary wing-fetithers differ; and
wdtli the increased length of the body in the pouter the
number of the sacral vertebrae is augmented. These im-
portant and correlated differences of structure do not in-
variably characterise any breed ; but if they had been
attended to and selected with as much care as the more
conspicuous external differences, there can hardly be a doubt
that they would have been rendered constant. Fanciers
could assuredly ha^e made a race of Tumblers with nine
instead of ten primary wing-feathers, seeing how often, the
number nine appears without any wish on their part, and
indeed in the case of the white- winged varieties in opposition
to their wish. In a similar manner, if tlie vertebrae had
230
DOMESTIC PIGEONS.
Chap; VI
been visible and had been attended to by fanciers, assuredly
au additional nuinber might easily have been fixed in ihe
Fonter. If these latter characters had once been rendered
constant, we should never have suspected that they had at
first been highly variable, or that they had aiisen from
correlation, in the one case witli the shortness of the wings,
and in the other case with the length of the body.
In order to understand how the chief domestic races have
become distinctly separated from each other, it is important
to bear in mind, that fanciers constantly try to breed from
the best birds, and consequently that those which are inferi(»r
in the requisite qualities are in each generation neglected;
so that after a time the less improved parent-stocks and
many subsequently formed intermediate grades become ex-
tinct. This has occurred in the case of the Pouter, Turbit,
and Trumpeter, for these highly improved breeds are now
left without any links closely connecting them either wuth
each other or with the aboriginal rock-pigeon. In othei-
countries, indeed, where the same care has not been applied,
or where the same fashion has not prevailed, the earlier
forms may long remain unaltered, or altered only in a slight
degree, and we are thus sometimes enabled to recover tlie
connecting links. This is the case in Persia and India with
the Tumbler and Carrier, which there differ but slightly from
the rock-pigeon in the proportions of their beaks. iSo again
in Java, the Fantail sometimes has only foniteen caudal
feathers, and the tail is much less elevated and expanded
than in our improved birds; so that the Java bird forms a
link between a first-rate Fantail and the rock-pigeon.
Occasionally a breed may be retained for some particular
qualify in a nearly unaltered condition in the same country,
together with highly modified off-slioots or sub-breeds, which
are valued for some distinct property. VV^e see this ex-
emplified in England, where the common Tumbler, which is
valued only for its flight, does not differ much from its
parent- form, the Eastern Tumbler ; whereas the Short-faced
Tumbler has been prodigiously modified, from being valued,
not for its flight, but for other qualities. But the common-
flying Tumbler of Europe has alread}^ begun to branch out
CUAP. VI.
MANNEE OF FORMATION OF RACES.
231
into slightly different sub-breeds, such as the common
English Tumbler, the Dutch Eoller, the , Glasgow House-
tumbler, and the Long-faced Beard Tumbler, &c. ; and in the
course of centuries, unless fashions greatly change, these sub-
oreeds will diveige through the slow and insensible process
of unconscious selection, and become modified, in a greater
anil greater degree. After a time the perfectly .graduated
links which now connect all these sub-breeds together, will
be lost, for there would be no object and much difficulty in
retaining such a host of intermediate sub- varieties.
The piinciple of divergence, together with the extinction
of the many previously existing intermediate forms, is so
important for understanding the origin of domestic races, as
well as of species in a state of nature, that I will enlarge a
little more on this subject. Our third main group includes
Carriers, Barbs, and Hunts, which ai-e plainly related to one
another, yet wonderfully distinct in several important cha-
racters. According to the view given in the last chapter,
these .three races have probably descended from an unknown
race having an intermediate character, and this race from the
rock-pigeon. Their characteristic differences are believed to
be due to different breeders having at an early period admired
different points of structure ; and then, on the acknowledged
principle of admiring extremes, having gone on breeding,
Muthout any thought of the future, as good birds as they
could, — Carrier- fanciers preferring long beaks with much
wattle, — Barb-fanciers preferring short thick beaks with
much eye-wattle, — and Eunt-fanciers not caring about the
beak or wattle, but only for the size and weight of the body.
This process would have led to the neglect and final extinc-
tion of the earlier, inferior, and intermediate birds ; and thus
it has come to pass, that in Europe these three races are now
extraordinarily distinct from each other. But in the East,
whence they were originally brought, the fashion has been
different, and we there see breeds which connect the highly
modified English Carrier with the rock-pigeon, and others
which to a certain extent connect Carriers and Hunts. Look-
ing back to the time of Aldrovandi, we find that there
existed in Europe, before the year 1600, four breeds Avhich
232
DOMESTIC PIGEONS.
ClIAI'. VI
were closely allied to Carriers and Barbs, but which competent
authorities cannot now identify with our present Barbs and
Carriers ; nor can Aldrovandi’s Eunts be identified with our
present Eunts. These four breeds certainly did not differ
from each other nearly so much as do our existing English
Carriers, Barbs, and Eunts. All this is exactly what might
have been anticipated. If we could collect all the pigeons
which have ever lived, from before the time of the Eomans
to the present day, we should be able to group them in
several lines, diverging from the parent rock-pigeon. Each
line would consist of almost insensible steps, occasionally
liroken by some slightly greater variation or sport, and each
would culminate in one of our present highly modified forms.
Of the many former connecting links, some would be found
t > have become absolutely extinct without having left any
issue, whilst others, though extinct, would be recognized as
the progenitors of the existing races.
I have heal'd it remarked as a strange circumstance that
we occasionally hear of the local or complete extinction of
domestic races, whilst we hear nothing of their origin. How,
it has been asked, can these losses be compensated, and more
than compensated, for we kimw that with almost all domes-
ticated animals the races have largely increased in number
since the time of the Eomans? But on the view here given,
we can understand this apparent contradiction. The ex-
tinction of a race within historical times is an event likely
to be noticed ; but its gradual and scarcely sensible modifi-
cation through unconscious selection, and its subsequent
divergence, either in the same or more commonly in distant
countries, into two or more strains, and their gradual conver-
sion into sub-breeds, and these into well-marked breeds are
events which would rarely be noticed. The death of a tree,
that has attained gigantic dimensions, is recorded ; the slow
growth of smaller trees and their increase in number excite
Jio attention.
In accordance with the belief in the great power of selection,
and of the little direct power of changed conditions of life,
except in causing general variability or plasticity of organisa-
tion, it is not surprising that dovecot- pigeons have remained
Chap. VI. MANNER OF FORMATION OF RACES. 23‘3
UD altered fi-om time immemorial ; and that some toy-pigeons,
which (Utter in little else besides colour from the dovecot-
pigeon, have retained the same character for several centuries.
For when one of these toy-pigeons had once become beautifully
and symmetrically coloured, — when, for instance, a Spot had
])een produced with the crown of its head, its tail, and tail-
coverts of a uniform colour, the rest of the body being snow-,
white, — no alteration or improvement would be desired. On
the other hand, it is not surprising that during this same
interval of time our highly-bred pigeons have undergone an
astonishing amount of change; for in regard to them there
is no defined limit to the wish of the fancier, and there is no
known limit to the variability of their characters. What is
there to stoj) the fancier desiring to give to his Carrier a
longer and longer beak, or to his Tumbler a shinter and
sh'jrter beak ? nor has the extreme limit of variability in the
beak, if there be any such limit, as yet been reached. Not-
withstanding the great improvement eftected within recent
times in the Short-faced Almond Tumbler, Mr. Eaton remarks,
the field is still as open for fresh competitors as it was one
hundred years ago ; ’ but this is perhaps an exaggerated
assertion, for the young of all highly-improved fancy birds
are extremely liable to disease and death.
I have heard it objected that the formation of the several
domestic races of the pigeon throws no light on the origin of
tlie wild species of the Golumbidfe, because their differences
are not of the same nature. The domestic races, for instance
do not differ, or differ hardly at all, in the relative lengths
and shape of the primary wing-feathers, in the relative
length of the hind toe, or in habits of life, as in roosting and
building in trees. But the above objection shows how com-
pletely the principle of selection has been misun^derstood. It
is not likely that characters selected by the caprice of man
should resemble differences preserved under natural conditions
either from being of direct service to each species, or from
standing in correlation with other modified and serviceable
structures. Until man selects birds differing in the relative
length of the wing-feathers or toes, &g., no sensible change
in these parts should be expected. Nor could man do anything
234
DOMESTIC PIGEONS.
ClIAl>. VI
unless these parts happened to vary under domestication :
1 do not pc'sitivel}" assert that this is the case, although I
have seen traces of such variability in the wing- feathers, and
certainly in the tail-feathers. It would bo a strange fact if
the relative length of the hind toe should never vary, seeing
how variable the foot is both in size and in the number of
the soutellaB. With respect to the domestic races not roosting
or building in trees, it is obx ious that fanciers would never
attend to or select such changes in habits ; but we have seen
that the pigeons in Egypt, which do not for some reason
like settling on the low mud hovels of the natives, are led,
apparently by compulsion, to perch in crowds on the trees.
\n e may even affirm that, if our doiue.'tic races had become
greatly modified in any of the above specifi.ed respects, and it
could be shown that fanciets had never attended to such
points, or that they did not stand in correlation with other
selected characters, the fact, on the principles advocated in
this chapter, would have offered a serious difficulty.
Let us briefly sum up the last two chapters on the pigeon.
We may conclude with confidence that all the domestic races,
notwithstanding their great amount of difference, are de-
scended from the Columba livia, including under this name
certain wild races. But the differences between the latter
throw no light whatever on the characters which distinguish
the domestic races. In each breed or sub-breed the individual
birds are more variable than birds in a state of nature ; and
occasionally they vary in a sudden and strongly-marked
manner, fldiis plasticity of organization aiDparently results
from changed conditions of life. Disuse has reduced certain
parts of the body. Correlation of growth so ties the organisa-
tion together, that when one part varies other parts vary at
the same time. When several breeds have once been formed,
their intercrossing aids the progress of modification, and has
even produced new sub-breeds. But as, in the construction
of a building, mere stones or bricks are of little avail without
the builder’s art, so, in the production of new races, selection
has been the presiding power. Fanciers can act by selection
on excessively slight individual differences, as well as on
Ihose greater differences which are called sports. Selection
Chap. \l.
MANNER OF FORMATION OF RACES.
235
is followed methodically when the fancier tries to improve
and modify a breed according to a prefixed standard of excel-
lence; or he acts unmethodically and unconsciously, by
merely tiying to rear as good birds as he can, without any
wish or intention to alter the breed. The progress ot
selection almost inevitably leads to the neglect and ultimate
extinction of the earlier and less improved forms, as well as
of many intermediate links in each long line of descent.
Thus it has come to pass that most of our present races are
so marvellously distinct from each other, and from the
aboriginal rock-pigeon.
236
FOWLS.
Chap. VII.
CHAPTER VII.
FOWLS.
BRIEF DESCRIPTIONS OP THE CHIEF BREFDS — ARGUMENTS IN FAVOUR OF
THEIR DESCENT FROM SEVERAL SPECIES — ARGUMENTS IN FAVOUR OP ALL
THE BREEDS HAVING DESCENDED FROM GaLLUS BANKIVA — REVERSION TO
THE PARENT-STOCK IN COLOUR ANALOGOUS VARIATIONS — ANCIENT
HISTORY OF THE FOWL — EXTERNAL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE SEVERAL
BREEDS — EGGS — CHICKENS — SECONDARY SEXUAL CHARACTERS — WING- AND
TAIL- FEATHERS, VOICE, DISPOSITION, ETC. — OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFERENCES
IN THE SKULL, VERTEBR.®, ETC. — EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE ON
CERTAIN PARTS — CORRELATION OF GROWTH.
As some naturalists may not be familiar with the chief breeds
of the fowl, it will be advisable to give a condensed descrip-
tion of them.^ From wdiat I have read and seen of specimens
brought from several quarters of the world, I believe that
most of the chief kinds have been imported into England, but
many sub-breeds are probably still unknown here. The
following discussion on the origin of the various breeds and
on their characteristic differences does not pretend to com-
pleteness, but may be of some interest to the naturalist. The
classification of the breeds cannot, as far as I can see, be made
natural. They differ from each other in different degrees, and
do not afford characters in subordination to each other, by
which they can be ranked in group under group. They seem
all to have diverged by independent and different roads from
a single tj^pe. Each chief breed includes differently coloured
sub-varieties, most of which can be truly propagated, but it
wmuld be superfluous to describe them. I have classed the
various crested fowls as sub-breeds under the Polish fowl ;
* 1 have drawn up this brief synop-
sis from various sources, but chiefly
from information given me by Mr.
Tegetmeier. This gentleman has
kindly looked through this chapter ;
and from his well-known knowledge,
the statements here given may be
fully trusted. Mr. Tegetmeier has
likewise assisted me in every possible
way in obtaining for me information
and specimens. I must not let this
opportunity pass without expressing
my cordial thanks to Mr. B. P. Brent,
a well-known writer on poultry, for
continuous assistance and the gift of
many specimens.
Chap. VIL
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
237
bat I have great doubts whether this is a natural arrange-
ment, showing true affinity or blood relationship. It is
scarcely possible to avoid laying stress on tlie commonness of
a breed; and if certain foreign sub-breeds had been largely
kept in this country they would perhaps have been raised to
the rank of main-breeds. Several breeds are abnormal in
character; that is, they differ in certain points from all wild
Gallinaceous birds. At first I made a division of the breeds
into normal and abnormal, but the result was wholly unsatis-
factory.
1. Game Breed. — This may be considered as the typical breed, as
it deviates only slightly from the wild Gallus hankiva, or, as perhaps
more correctly named, /ermy»?e4(s. Beak strong; comb single and
upright. Spurs long and sharp. Feathers closely appressed to the
body. Tail with the normal number of 14 feathers. Eggs often
pale buff. Disposition indomitably courageous, exhibited even in
the hens and chickens. An' unusual number of differently coloured
varieties exist, such as black and brown-breasted reds, duckwings,
blacks, whites, piles, &c., with their legs of various colours.
2. Malay Breed. — Body of great size, with head, neck, and legs
elongated ; carriage erect; tail small, sloping downwards, generally
formed of 16 feathers ; comb and wattle small ; ear-lobe and face
red ; skin yellowish ; feathers closely appressed to the body ; neck-
hackles short, narrow, and hard. Eggs often pale buff. Chickens
feather late. Disposition savage. Of Eastern origin.
3. Cochin, or Shangai Breed. — Size great ; wing feathers short,
arched, much hidden in the soft downy plumage ; barely capable of
flight ; tail short, generally formed of 16 feathers, developed at a
late period in the young males ; legs thick, feathered ; spurs short,
thick; nail of middle toe flat and broad; an additional toe not
rarely developed; skin yellowish. Comb and wattle well developed.
Skull with deep medial furrow ; occipital foramen, sub-triangular,
vertically elongated. Voice peculiar. Eggs rough, buff-coloured.
Disposition extremely quiet. Of Chinese origin.
4. Dorking Breed. — Size great; body square, compact; feet
with an additional toe ; comb well developed, but varies much in
form; wattles well developed; colour of plumage various. Skull
remarkably broad between the orbits. Of English origin.
The white Dorking may be considered as a distinct sub-breed,
being a less massive bird.
5. Spanish Breed (fig 30). — Tall, with stately carriage ; tarsi
long ; comb single, deeply serrated, of immense size ; wattles largely
developed ; the large ear-lobes and sides of face white. Plumage black
glossed with green. Do not incubate. Tender in constitution,
the comb being often injured by frost. Eggs white, smooth, of
large size. Chickens feather late but the young cocks show their
238
FOWLS.
Chap. VII.
masculine characters, and crow at an early age. Of Mediterranean
origin.
The Andalusians may be ranked as a sub-breed : they are of a
slaty-blue colour, and their chickens are well feathered. A smaller,
short-legged Dutch sub-breed has been described by some authors
as distinct.
Fig. 30.— Spanish Fowl.
6. Hamburgh Breed (fig. 31). — Size moderate ; comb flat, pro-
duced backwards, covered with numerous small points; wattle of
moderate dimensions; ear lobe white; legs blueish, thin. Do not
incubate. Skull, with the tips of the ascending branches of the
premaxillary and with the na'^al bones standing a little separate
from each other ; anterior margin of the frontal bones less depressed
than usual.
OiiAP. vn.
DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS.
239
There are two sub-breeds ; the spangUd Hamburgh, of English
origin, with the tips of the feathers marked with a dark spot ; and
the" pencilled Hamburgh, of Dutch origin, with dark transverse lines
across each feather, and with the body rather smaller. Both these
sub-breeds include gold and silver varieties, as well as some other
sub-varieties. Black Hamburghs have been produced by a cross
with the Spanish breed.
7. Crested or Polish Breed ffig. 32).— Head with a large,
rounded crest of feathers, suppor'ed on a hemispherical protuberance
Fig. 31 — Hamburgh Fowl.
of the frontal bones, which includes the anterior part of the brain.
The ascending branches of premaxillary bones and the inner nasal
processes are much shortened. • The orifice of the nostrils raised
and crescentic. Beak short. Comb absent, or small and of cre-
scentic shape; wattles either present or replaced by a beard-like
tuft of feathers. Legs leaden-blue. Sexual differences appear late
in life. Do not incubate. There are several beautiful varieties
which differ in colour and slightly in other respects.
240
FOWLS.
CHAr. VII.
The following sub-breeds agree in having a crest, more or less
developed, with the comb, when present, of crescentic shape. The
skull presents nearly the same remarkable peculiarities of structure
as in the true Polish fowl.
Sub-breed (a) Sultans. — A Turkish breed, resembling white
Polish fowls with a large crest and beard with short and well -
Fig. 32.— Polish Fowl.
feathered legs. The tail is furnished with additional sickle feathers
Do not incubate.^
Sub-breed (b) Ptarmigans. — An inferior breed closely allied to
2 The best account of Sultans is by kindness the examination of some
Miss Watts in ‘The Poultry Yard,’ specimens of this breed.
1856, p, 79. I owe to Mr. Brent’s
Chap. VII. DESCRIPTION OF BREEDS. 241
the last, white, rather small, legs much feathered, with the crest
pointed ; comb small, cupped ; wattles small.
Sub-breed (c) Glwondooks. — Another Turkish breed having an
extraordinary appearance ; black and tailless ; crest and beard large ;
legs feathered. The inner processes of the two nasal bones come
into contact with each other, owing to the complete abortion of the
ascending branches of the premaxillaries. I have seen an allied
white, tailless breed from Turkey.
Sub-breed (d) Creve-coeur. — A French breed of large size, barely
capable of flight, with short black legs, head crested, comb produced
into two points or horns, sometimes a little branched like thediorns
of a stag ; both beard and wattles present. Eggs large. Disposition
quiet.^
Sub-breed (e) TIorntd fowl. — With a small crest; comb produced
into two great points, supported on two bony protuberances.
Sub-breed (/) Ilowlan. — A French breed ; of moderate size, short-
legged with five toes, well developed ; plumage invariably mottled
with black, white, and straw-yellow ; head furnislied with a crest, on
a triple comb placed transversely ; both wattles and beard present.^
Sub-breed (g) Guelderlunds. — No comb, head said to be surmounted
by a longitudinal crest of soft velvety feathers ; nostrils said to be
crescentic; wattles well developed; legs feathered; colour black.
From North America. The Breda fowl seems to be closely allied to
the Guelder land.
8. Bantam Breed. — Originally from Japan,® characterised by
small size alone ; carriage bold and erect. There are several sub-
breeds, such as the Cochin, Game, and Sebright Bantams, some of
which have been recently formed by various crosses. The Black
Bantam has a differently shaped skull, with the occipital foramen
like that of the Cochin fowl.
9. Bumpless Fowls. — These are so variable in character® that
they hardly deserve to be called a breed. Any one who will examine
the caudal vertebrae will see how monstrous the breed is.
10. Cr^ebpers or Jumpers. — These are characterized by an almost
monstrous shortness of legs, so that they move by jumping rather
than by walking; they are said not to scratch up the ground. I
have examined a Burmese variety, which had a skull of rather
unusual shape.
11. Frizzled or Caffre Fowls. — Not uncommon in India, with
the feathers curling backwards, and with the primary feathers of
the wing and tail imperfect; periosteum of bones black.
^ A good description, with figures,
is given of this sub-breed in the
‘Journal of Horticulture,’ June 10th,
1862, p. 206.
* A description, with figures, is
given of this breed in ‘ Journal of
Horticulture,’ June 3rd, 1862, p. 186.
Some writers describe the comb as
two-horned.
® Mr. Crawfurd, ‘ Descript. Diet,
of the Indian Islands,’ p. 1 13. Ban-
tams are mentioned in an ancient
native Japanese Encycloptedia, as I am
informed by Mr. Birch of the British
Museum.
® ‘ Ornamental and Domestic Poul-
try,’ 1848.
17
2\2
FO^^'LS.
Chap. VTI
12. Silk Fowls.— Feathers silky, with the primary wing and
tail-feathers imperfect; skin and periosteum of bones black; comb
and wattles dark leaden-blue ; ear-lappets tinged with blue; legs
thin, often furnished with an additional toe. Size rather small.
13. Sooty Fowls. — An Indian breed, having the peculiar appear-
ance of a white bird smeared with soot, with black skin and
periosteum. The hens alone are thus characterised.
From this synopsis we see that the several breeds differ
considerably, and they would have been nearly as interesting
for us as pigeons, if there had been equally good evidence
that all had descended from one parent-species. Most fanciers
believe that they are descended from several primitive stocks.
The Eev. E. S. Dixon argues strongly on this side of the
question ; and one fancier even denounces the opposite con-
clusion by asking, “ Do we not perceive pervading this spirit,
the spirit of the Deist f ” Most naturalists, with the exception
of a few, such as Temminck, believe that all the breeds have
proceeded from a single species ; but authority on such a point
goes for little. Fanciers look to all parts of the world as the
possible sources of their unknown stocks ; thus ignoring the
laws of geographical distribution. They know well that the
several kinds breed truly even in colour. They assert, but, as
we shall see, on very weak grounds, that niost of the breeds
are extremely ancient. They are strongly impressed with the
great difference between the chief kinds, and they ask with
force, can differences in climate, food, or treatment have pro-
duced birds so different as the black stately Spanish, the
diminutive elegant Bantam, the heavy Cochin with its many
peculiarities, and the Polish fowl wdth its great top -knot and
protuberant skull? But fanciers, whilst admitting and even
overrating the effects of crossing the various breeds, do not
sufficiently regard the probability of the occasional birth,
during the course of . centuries, of birds with abnormal and
hereditary peculiarities ; they overlook the effects of correla-
tion of growth— of the long-continued use and disuse of parts,
and of some direct result from changed food and climate,
though on this latter head I have found no sufficient evidence;
and lastly, they all, as far as I know, entirely overlook the all-
important subject of unconscious or unmethodical selection
^ ‘ Ornamental and Domestic Poultry.’ 1848.
Chap. VII
THEIR PARENTAGE.
243
though they are well aware that their birds differ individually
and that by selecting the best birds for a few generations they,
can improve their stocks.
. An amateur writes ^ as follows ' The fact that poultry
have until lately received but little attention at the hands ol
the fancier, and been entirely conftned to the domains of tlie
producer for the market, would alone suggest the improba-
bility of that constant and unremitting attention having been
observed in breeding, which is requisite to the consummating
in the offspring of any two birds transmittable forms not
exhibited by the parents.” This at first sight appears true.
Silt in a future chapter on Selection, abundant facts will be
given showing not only that careful breeding, but that actual
selection was practised during ancient periods, and by barely
civilized races of man. In the case of the fowl I can adduce
no direct facts showing that selection was anciently practised ;
but the Eomans at the commencement of the Christian era-
kept six or seven breeds, and Columella “ particularly recom-
mends as the best, those sorts that have five toes and white
ears.” ® In the fifteenth century several breeds were known
and described in Europe ; and in China, at nearly the same
period, seven kinds were named. A more striking case is that
at present, in one of the Philippine Islands, the semi-barbarous
inhabitants have distinct native names for no less than nine
sub -breeds of the Game fowl.^® Azara,^^ who wrote towards
the close of the last century, states that hi the interior parts
of South America, where I should not have expected that the
least care would have been taken of poultry, a black-skinned
and black-boned breed is kept, from being considered fertile
and its flesh good for sick persons. Now every one who has
kept poultry knows how impossible it is to keep several
breeds distinct unless the utmost care be taken in separating
the sexes. Will it then be pretended that those persons who,
® Ferguson’s ‘ Illustrated Series of of the Domesticated Animals to Civili-
Rare and Prize Poixltry,’ 1854, p. vi. zation,’ separately printed, p. (5; first
Preface. • read before the Brit, Assoc, at Oxford,
® Rev. E. S. Dixon, in his ‘ Orna- 1860.
mental Poultry,’ p. 20.3, gives an ac- ” ‘Quadrup^des du Paraguay,’ tcm.
count of Columella’s work. ii. p. 324.
Mr. Crawfurd ‘ On the Relation
244
FOWLS.
Chap. Vll
in ancient times and in semi-civilized countries tc ok pains to
keep the breeds distinct, and who therefore valued them,
would not occasionally have destroyed inferior birds and occa-
sionally have preserved their best birds? This is all that is
required. It is not pretended that any one in ancient times
intended to form a new breed, or to modify an old breed
according to some ideal standard of excellence. He who
cared for poultry would merely wish to obtain, and afterwards
to rear, the best birds which he could ; but this occasional
preservation of the best birds would in the course of time
modify the breed, as surely, though by no means as rapidly,
as does methodical selection at the present day. If one person
out of a hundred or out of a thousand attended to the breeding
of his birds, this would be sufficient ; for the birds thus tended
would soon become superior to others, and would form a new
strain ; and this strain would, as explained in the last chapter
slowly have its characteristic differences augmented, and at
last be converted into a new sub-breed or breed. But breeds
would often be for a time neglected and would deteriorate ;
they would, however, partially retain their character, and
afterwards might again come into fashion and be raised to a
standard of perfection higher than their former standard ; as
has actually occurred quite recently with Polish fowls. If,
however, a breed were utterly neglected, it would become
extinct, as has recently happened with one of the Polish sub-
breeds. Whenever in the course of past centuries a bird
appeared with some slight abnormal structure, such as with a
lark-like crest on its head, it would probably often have been
preserved from that love of novelty which leads some persons
in England to keep rumpless fowls, and others in India to
keep frizzled fowls. And after a time any such abnormal
appearance would be carefully preserved, from being esteemed
a sign of the purity and excellence of the breed ; for on this
l^rinciple the Romans eighteen centuries ago valued the fifth
toe and the white ear-lobe in their fowls.
Thus from the occasional appearance of abnormal cha-
racters, though at first only slight in degree; from the effects
of the use and the disuse of parts ; possibly from the direct
effects of changed climate and food ; from correlation of
Chap. Vll
THEIE PARENTAGE.
245
growth ; from occasional reversions to old and long-lost
characters ; from the crossing of breeds, when more than
one had }^en formed ; but, above all, from unconscious
selection carried on during many generations, there is no
insuperable difficulty, to the best of my judgment, in believ-
ing that all the breeds have descended from some one parent-
source. Can any single species be named from which we
may reasonably suppose that all are descended^? The Gallas
hanhiva apparently fulfils every requirement. I have already
given as fair an account as I could of the arguments in
favour of the multiple origin of the several breeds ; and now
I will give those in favour of their common descent from
G. hanhiva.
But it will be convenient first briefly to describe all the known
species of Callus. The O. sonneratii does not range into the northern
parts of India; according to Colonel Sykes/^ it presents at different
heights of the Ghauts, two strongly marked varieties, perhaps
deserving to be called species. It was at one time thought to be
the primitive stock of all our domestic breeds, and this shows that
it closely approaches the common fowl in general structure ; but its
hackles partially consist of highly peculiar, horny laminae, trans-
versely banded with three colours ; and I have met no authentic
account of any such character having been observed in any domestic
breed.^^ This species also differs greatly from the common fowl, in
the comb being finely serrated, and in the loins being destitute of
true hackles. Its voice is utterly different. It crosses readily in
India with domestic hens ; and Mr Blyth raised nearly 100 hybrid
chickens; but they were tender and mostly died whilst young.
Those which were reared were absolutely sterile when crossed inter
se or with either parent. At the Zoological Gardens, however, some
hybrids of the same parentage were not quite so sterile : Mr. Dixon,
as he informed me, made, with Mr. Yarrell’s aid, particular inquiries
on this subject, and was assured that out of 50 eggs only five or six
chickens were reared. Some, however, of these half-bred birds were
crossed with one of their parents, namely, a Bantam, and produced
a few extremely feeble chickens. Mr. Dixon also procured some of
these same birds and crossed them in several ways, but all were
‘ Proc. Zoolog, Soc.’ 1832, p,
151.
These feathers have been de-
scribed by Dr. W, Marshall, ‘ Der Zoology
Garten,’ April 1874, p. 124. I ex-
amined the feathers of some hybrids
raised in the Zoological Gardens
between the male G. sonneratii and a
red game-hen, and they exhibited the
true character of those of G. sonne-
ratii, except that the horny laminae
were much smaller.
See also an excellent letter on
the Poultry of India, by Mr. Blyth,
in ‘Gardiner’s Chronicle,’ 1851, p
619.
246
FOWLS.
Chap. Vll
more or less infertile. Nearly' similar experiments have recently
been tried on a great scale in the Zoological Gardens with almost
the same resnlt.^“ Out of 500 eggs, raised from various first crosses
and hybrids, between G. somieraUi, hankiva, and varius, only 12
chickens were reared, and of these only three were the product of
hybrids inter se. From these facts, and from the above-mentioned
strongly-marked differences in structure between the domestic fowl
and (r. sonneratii, we may reject this latter species as the parent of
any domestic breed.
Ceylon possesses a fowl peculiar to the island, viz. G. stanleyii ;
this species approaches so closely (except in the colouring of the
comb) to the domestic fowl, that Messrs. Layard and Kellaert would
have considered it, as they inform me, as one of the parent-stocks,
had it not been for its singularly different voice. This bird, like the
last, crosses readily with tame hens, and even visits solitary farms
and ravishes them. Two hybrids, a male and female, thus produced,
were found by Mr. Mitford to be quite sterile : both inherited the
peculiar voice of G. stanleyii. This species, then, may in all pro-
bability be rejected as one of the primitive stocks of the domestic
fowl.
Java and the islands eastward as far as Flores are inhabited by
G. varius (or furcatus), which differs in so many characters — green
plumage, unserrated comb, and single median wattle — that no one
supposes it to have been the parent of any one of our breeds ; yet,
as I am informed by Mr. Crawfurd,’^ hybrids are commonly raised
between the male G. varius and the common hen, and are kept for
their great beauty, but are invariably sterile : this, however, was
not the case with some bred in the Zoological Gardens. These
hybrids were at one time thought to be specifically distinct, and
were named G. oeneus. Mr. Blyth and others believe that the G.
temminckii^^ (of which the history is not known) is a similar hybrid.
Sir J. Brooke sent me some skins of domestic fowls from Borneo,
and across the tail of one of these, as Mr. Tegetmeier observed, there
were transverse blue bands like those which he had seen on the tail-
feathers of hybrids from G. varius, reared in the Zoological Gardens.
This fact apparently indicates that some of the fowls of Borneo have
been slightly affected by crosses with G. varius, but the case may
possibly be one of analogous variation. I may just allude to the G.
giyanteus, so often referred to in works on poultry as a wild species ;
but Marsden the first describer, speaks of it as a tame breed ; and
the specimen in the British Museum evidently has the aspect of a
domestic variety.
Mr. S. J. Salter, in ‘ Natural
History Review,’ April 1863, p. 276.
See also Mr. Layard’s paper in
‘ Annals and Mag. of Nat. History,’
2nd series, vol. xiv. p. 62.
See also Mr. Crawfurd’s ‘ Descrip-
tive Diet, of the Indian Islands,’ 1856,
p. 113.
Described by Mr. G. R. Gray,
‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc,’ 1849, p. 62.
The passage from IVIarsden is
given by Mr. Di.xon in his ‘Poultry.
Book,’ p. 176. No ornithologist nov
ranks this bird as a distinct species.
Chap. VII
THEIR PARENTAGE.
247
The last species to be mentioned, namely, Oallzifi bankiva, has a
much wider geographical range than the three previous species ; it
inhabits Northern India as far west as Sinde, and ascends the
Himalaya to a height of 4000 ft. ; it inhabits Burmah, the Malajy^
peninsula, the Indo-Chinese countries, the Philippine Islands, and
the Malayan archipelego as far eastward as Timor. This species
varies considerably in the wild state. Mr. Blyth informs me that
the specimens, both male and female, brought from near the
Himalaya, are rather paler coloured than those from other parts of
India ; whilst those from the Malay peninsula and Java are brighter
coloured than the Indian birds. I have seen specimens from these
countries, and the difference of tint in the hackles was conspicuous.
The Malayan hens were a shade redder on the breast and neck than
the Indian hens. The Malayan males generally had a red ear-lappet,
instead of a white one as in India ; but Mr. Blyth has seen one
Indian specimen without the white ear-lappet. The legs are leaden
blue in the Indian, whereas they show some tendency to be yellowish
in the Malayan and Javan specimens. In the former Mr. Blyth
finds the tarsus remarkably variable in length. According to
Temminck the Timor specimens differ as a local race from that of
Java. These several wild varieties have not as yet been ranked as
distinct species ; if they should, as is not unlikely, be hereafter thus
ranked, the circumstance would be quite immaterial as far as the
parentage and differences of our domestic breeds are concerned.
Tiie wild 6r. bankiva agrees most closely with the black-breasted
red Game-breed, in colouring and in all other respects, except in
being smaller, and in the tail being carried mmre horizontally. But
the manner in which the tail is carried is highly variable in many
of our breeds, for, as Mr. Brent informs me, the tail slopes much in
the Malays, is erect in the Games and some other breeds, and is
more than erect in Dorkings, Bantams, &c. There is one other
difference namely, that in G. bankiva, according to Mr. Blyth. the
neck-hackles when first moulted are replaced during two or three
months not by other hackles, as with our domestic poultry, but by
short blackish feathers. Mr. Brent, however, has remarked that
these black feathers remain in the wild bird after the development
of the lower hackles, and appear in the domestic bird at the same
time with them : so that the only difference is that the lower hackles
are replaced more slowly in the wild than in the tame bird ; but as
confinement is known sometimes to affect the masculine plumage,
this slight difference cannot be considered of any importance. It is
a significant fact that the voice of both the male and female G.
bankiva closely resembles, as Mr. Blyth and others have noted, the
voice of both sexes of the common domestic fowl ; but the last note
of the crow of the wild bird is rather less prolonged. Captain
‘ Coup-d’oeil general sur I’lnde Mr. Blyth, in ‘ Annals and M.ag.
Archipelagique,’ tom, iii. (184-9), p. of Nat. Hist.,’ 2nd ser., vol. i. (1848),
177 ; see also Mr. Blyth in ‘ Indian p. 455
Sporting Review,’ vol. ii. p. 5, 1856.
248
FOWLS.
Chap. VII
Hutton, well known for hin researches into the natural history ol
India, informs me that he has seen several crossed fowls from the
wild species and the Chinese bantam ; these crossed fowls bred freely
with bantams, but unfortunately were not crossed inter se. Captain
Hutton reared chickens from the eggs of the Qallus bankiva ; and
these, though at first very wild, afterwards became so tame that they
would crowd round his feet. He did not succeed in rearing them
to maturity ; but as he remarks, no wild gallinaceous bird thrives
well at first on hard grain.” Mr. Ely th also found much difficulty in
keeping G. bankiva in confinement. In the Philippine Islands,
however, the natives must succeed better, as they keep wild cocks
to fight with their domestic game-birds.^^ Sir Walter Elliot informs
me that the hen of a native domestic breed of Pegu is undistinguish-
able from the hen of the wild O. bankiva ; -and the natives constantly
catch wild cocks by taking tame cocks to fight with them in the
woods.^^ Mr. Crawfurd remarks that from etymology it might he
argued that the fowl was first domesticated by the Malays and
Javanese.''^^ It is also a curious fact, of which I have been assured
by Mr. Blyth, that wild specimens of the G alius bankiva, brought
from the countries east of the Bay of Bengal, are far more easily
tamed than those of India; nor is this an unparalleled fact, for, as
Humboldt long ago remarked, the same species sometimes evinces a
more tameable disposition in one country than in another. If we
suppose that the G. bankiva was first tamed in Malaya and afterwards
imported into India, we can understand an observation made to me
by Mr. Blyth, that the domestic fowls of India do not resemble the
wild G. bankiva of India more closely than do those of Europe.
From the extremely close resemblance in colour, general
structure, and especially in voice, between Gallus bankiva and
the Game fowl; from their fertility, as far as this has been
ascertained, when crossed; from the possibility of the wild
species being tamed, and from its varying in the wild state,
we may confidently look at it as the parent of the most
typical of all the domestic breeds, namely, the Game fowl.
It is a significant fact, that almost all the naturalists in
India, namely Sir W. Elliot, Mr. S. N. Ward, Mr. Layard,
Mr. J. C. Jerdon, and Mr. Blyth,^^ who are familiar with
G. bankiva, believe that it is the parent of most or all oui
Crawfurd, ‘ Desc. Diet, of Indian
Islands,’ 1856, p. 112.
23 In Burmaii, as I hear from Mr.
Blyth, the wild and tame poultry con-
stantly cross together, and irregular
transitional forms may be seen.
2* Ibid. p. 113.
2® Mr. Jerdon, in the ‘ Madras
Journ. of Lit. and Science.’ vol. xxii
p, 2, speaking of G. bankiva, says, “ un-
questionably the origin of most of the
varieties of our common fowls.” For
Mr. Blyth, see his excellent article in
‘Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1851, p. 619;
and in ‘ Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist..,’
vol. XX,, 1847, p, 388.
UiiAP. TIL
THEIR PARENTAGE.
249
domestic breeds. But even if it be admitted that G. hanJciva
is the parent of the Game breed, yet it may be urged that
other wild species have been the parents of the other domestic
breeds ; and that these species still exist, though unknowm, in
some country, or have become extinct. The extinction, how-
ever, of several species of fowls, is an improbable hj^pothesis,
seeing that the four known species have not become extinct
in the most ancient and thickl}’- peopled regions of the- East.
There is, in fact, not one other kind of domesticated bird,
of which the wild parent-form is unknown, that is become
extinct. For the discovery of new, or the rediscovery of old
species of Gallus, we must not look, as fanciers often look, to
the whole world. The larger gallinaceous birds, as Mr. Blyth
has remarked,^® generally have a restricted range : we see
this well illustrated in India, where the genus Galliis in-
habits the base of the Himalaya, and is succeeded higher up
by Gallophasis, and still higher up by Phasianus. Australia,
with its islands, is out of the question as the home for
unknown species of the genus. It is, also, as improbable
that Gallas should inhabit South America as 'that a
‘Gardiner’s Chronicle’ 1851, p.
619.
2^ I haA’e consulted an eminent
authority, Mr. Sclater, on this subject,
and he thinks that I have not expressed
myself too strongly. I am awai’e that
one ancient author, Acosta, speaks of
fowls as having inhabited S. America
at the period of its discovery ; and
more recently, about 1795, Olivier de
Serres speaks of wild fowls in the
forests of Guiana ; these were probably
feral birds. Dr. Daniell tells me, he
believes that fowls have become wild
on the west coast of Equatoi ial
Africa ; they may, however, not be
true fowls, but gallinaceous birds
belonging to the genus Phasidns.
The old voyager Barbut says that
poultry are not natural to Guinea.
Capt. W. Alien (‘Narrative of Niger
Expedition,’ 1848, vol. ii. p. 42) de-
scribes wild fowls on Ilha dos Rollas,
an island near St. Thomas’s on the
west coast of Africa ; the natives in-
formed him that they had escaped
from a vessel wrecked there manj
years ago ; they were extremely wild
and had ‘‘a cry quite different to that
of the domestic fowl,” and their ap-
pearance was somewhat changed.
Hence it is not a little doubtful, not-
withstanding the statement of the
natives, whether these birds really
were fowls. That the fowl has
become feral on several islands is
certain. Mr. Fry, a very capable
judge, informed Mr. Layard, in a
tetter, that the fowls which have run
wild on Ascension “ had nearly all got
back to their primitive colours, red,
and black cocks, and smoky-grey
hens.” But unfortunately we do not
know the colour of the poultry which
were turned out. Fowls havebecom.e
feral on the Nicobar Islands (Blyth
in the ‘Indian Field,’ 1858, p. 62),
and in theLadrones (Anson’s Voyage).
Those found in the Pellew Islands
Crawfurd) are believed to be feral
250
FOWLS.
Chap. VII
humming-bird should be found in the Old World. From the
character of the other gallinaceous birds of Africa, it is not
probable that Gallus is an African genus. We need not
look to the western parts of Asia, for Messrs. Blyth and
Crawfurd, who have attended to this subject, doubt whether
Gallus ever existed in a wild state even as far west as Persia.
Although the eai Best Greek writers speak of the fowl as a
Persian biid, this probably merely indicates its line of
importation. For the discovery of unknown species we must
look to India, to the Indo-Chinese countries, and to the
northern parts of the Malay Archipelago. The southern
portion of China is the most likely country; but as Mr.
Bl3Th informs me, skins have been exported from China
during a long period, and living birds are largely kept there
in aviaries, so that any native species of Gallus would pro-
bably have become known. Mr. Birch, of the British
Museum, has translated for me passages from a Chinese
Encyclopaedia published in 1609, but compiled from more
ancient documents, in which it is said that fowls are
creatures of the West, and were introduced into the East
{i.e. China) in a dynasty 1400 b.c. Whatever may be thought
of so ancient a date, we see that the Indo-Chinese and Indian
regions were formerly considered by the Chinese as the source
of the domestic fowl. From these several considerations we
must look to the present metropolis of the genus, namely, to
the south-eastern parts of Asia, for the discovery of species
which were formerly domesticated, but are now unknown in
the wild state ; and the most experienced ornithologists do
not consider it probable that such species will be discovered.
In considering whether the domestic breeds are descended
from one species, namely, G. bankiva, or from several, we must
not quite overlook, though we must not exaggerate, the im-
portance of the test of fertility. Most of our domestic breeds
have been so often crossed, and their mongrels so largely
kept, that it is almost certain, if any degree of infertility
had existed between them, it would have been detected. On
the other hand, the four known species of Gallus when
and lastly, it is asserted that they but whether this is correct I know
have become feral in New Zealand. not.
Cjiap. VIL KEVEESrON AND ANALOGOUS EEVEESION.
251
crossed witli each otlier, or when crossed, with the exception
of 6r. hanklva, with the domestic fowl, produce infertile
h3’’brids.
Finally, we have not such good evidence with fowls as
with pigeons, of all the breeds having descended from a
single primitive stock. In both cases the argument of
fertility must go for something ; in both we have the im-
probability of man having succeeded in ancient times in
thoroughly domesticating several supposed species, — most of
these supposed species being extremely abnormal as compared
with their natural allies, — all being now either unknown or
extinct, though the parent- form of no other domesticated bird
has been lost. But in searching for the supposed parent-
stocks of the various breeds of the pigeon, we were enabled
to confine our search to species having peculiar habits of life ;
whilst with fowls there is nothing in their habits in any
marked manner distinct from those of other gallinaceous
birds. In the case of pigeons, I have shown that purely-
bred birds of every race and the crossed offspring of distinct
races frequently resemble, or revert to, the wild rock-pigeon
in general colour and in each characteristic mark. With
fowls we have facts of a similar nature, but less strongly
pronounced, which we will now discuss.
Reversion and Analogous Variation. — Purely-bred Game,
Malay, Cochin, Dorking, Bantam, and, as I hear from Mr.
Tegetmeier, Silk fowls, may frequently or occasionally be
met with, which are almost identical in plumage with the
wild 6r. hanldva. This is a fact well deserving attention,
when we reflect that these breeds rank amongst the most
distinct. Fo wls thus coloured are called by amateurs black-
breasted reds. Hamburghs properly have a very different
plumage ; nevertheless, as Mr. Tegetmeier informs me, “ the
great difficulty in breeding cocks of the golden-spangled
variety is their tendency to have black breasts and red backs.^
The males of white Bantams and white Cochins, as thev
come to maturity, often assume a yellowish or saffron tinge ;
and the longer neck hackles of black Bantam cocks, when
2* Ml. Hewitt, in ‘The Poultry Book,’ by W. B. Tegetmeier, 1866, p. 248.
252
FOWLS.
CiiAi-. VIE.
two or three years old, not uncommonly become ruddy ; these
latter Bantams occasionally “ even moult brassy-winged, or
actually red-shouldered.” So that in these several cases we
see a plain tendency to reversion to the hues of G. hankiva,
even during the lifetime of the individual bird. With
Spanish, Polish, pencilled Hamburgh, silver-spangled Ham-
burgh fowls, and with some other less common breeds, I have
never heard of a black-breasted red bird having appeared.
From, my experience with pigeons, I made the following
crosses. I first killed all my own poultry, no others living
near my house, and then procured, by Mr. Tegetmeier’s
assistance, a first-rate black Spanish cock, and hens of the
following pure breeds, — white Game, white Cochin, silver-
spangled Polish, silver-spangled Hamburgh, silver-pencilled
Hamburgh, and white Silk. In none of these breeds is there
a trace of red, nor when kept pure have I ever heard of the
appearance of a red feather; though such an occurrence
would perhaps not be very improbable with white Games
and white Cochins. Of the many chickens reared from the
above six crosses the majority were black, both in the down
and in the first plumage ; some were white, and a very few
were mottled black and white. In one lot of eleven mixed
eggs from the white Game and white Cochin by the black
Spanish cock, seven of the chickens were white, and only
four black. I mention this fact to show that whiteness of
plumage is strongly inherited, and that the belief in the
prepotent power in the male to transmit his colour is not
always correct. The chickens were hatched in the spring,
and in the latter part of August several of the young cocks
began to exhibit a change, which with some of them increased
during the following years. Thus a young male bird from
the silver- spangled Polish hen was in its first plumage coal-
black, and combined in its comb, crest, wattle, and beard, the
characters of both parents ; but when two years old the
secondary wing-feathers became largely and symmetrically
marked with white, and, wherever in G. hankiva the hackles
are red, they were in this bird greenish-black along the shaft,
narrowly bordered with brownish-black, and this again
broadlj" bordered with very pale yellowish-bro’vvn ; so that in
Chap. VII. REVERSION AND ANALOGOUS REVERSION. 253
general appearance the plumage had become pale-colonred
instead of black. In this case, with advancing age there
was a great change, but no reversion to the red colour of
G. bankiva.
A cock with a regular rose comb derived either from the
spangled or pencilled silver Hamburgh was likewise at first
quite black ; but in less than a year the neck-hackles, as in
the last case, became whitish, whilst those _ on the loins
assumed a decided reddish-yellow tint ; and here we see the
first symptom of reversion ; this likewise occurred with some
other young cocks, which need not here be described. It has
also been recorded by a breeder, that he crossed two silver-
pencilled Hamburgh hens with a Spanish cock, and reared a
number of chickens, all of which were black, the cocks having
golden and the hens brownish hackles ; so that in this instance
likewise there was a clear tendency to reversion.
Two young cocks from my white Game hen were at first
snow white ; of these, one subsequently assumed pale orange-
coloured hackles, chiefly on the loins, and the other an
abundance of fine orange red hackles on the neck, loins, and
upper wing-coverts. Here again we have a more decided,
though partial, reversion to the colours of G. hankim. This
second cock was in fact coloured like an inferior “pile Game
cock;” — now this sub-breed can be produced, as I am in-
formed by Mr. Tegetmeier, by crossing a black-breasted red
Game cock with a white Game hen, and the “ pile ” sub-
breed thus produced can afterwards be truly propagated. So
that we have the curious fact of the glossy-black Spanish
cock and the black-breasted red Game cock when crossed
with white Game hens producing offspring of nearly the
same colours.
I reared several birds from the white Silk hen by the
Spanish cock : all were coal-black, and all plainly showed
their parentage in having blackish combs and bones ; none
inherited the so-called silky feathers, and the non-inheritance
of this character has been . observed by others. The hens
never varied in their plumage. As the young eocks grew
‘ Journal of Horticulture,’ Jan. 14th, 1862, p. 325.
FOWLS.
Chap VIL
2fii
old, one of them assumed yellowish-white hachles, and thus
veseinbled in a considerable degree the cross from the Ham-
burgh hen; the other became a gorgeous bird, so much so
that an acquaintance had it preserved and stuffed simply from
its beauty. When stalking about it closely resembled the
wild Gallus hanhiva, but with the red feathers I’ather darker.
On close comparison one considerable difference presented
itself, namely, that the primary and secondary wing-feathers
were edged with greenish-black, instead of being edged, as in
G. hanJdca, with fulvous and red tints. The space, also,
across the back, which bears dark-green feathers, was broader,
and the comb was blackish. In all other respects, even in
trifling details of plumage, there was the closest accordance.
Altogether it was a marvellous sight to compare this bird
first with G. hanldva, and then with its father, the glossy
green-black Spanish cock, and with its diminutive mother,
the white Silk hen. This case of reversion is the more ex-
traordinary as the Spanish breed has long been known to
breed true, and no instance is on record of its throwing a
single red feather. The Silk hen likewise breeds true, and
is believed to be ancient, for Aldrovandi, before 1600, alludes
probably to this breed, and described it as covered with wool.
It is so peculiar in many characters that some writers have
considered it as specifically distinct ; yet, as we now see,
when crossed with the Spanish fowl, it yields offspring
closely resembling the wild G. hanJdva.
Mr. Tegetmeier has been so kind as to repeat, at my
request, the cross between a Spanish cock and Silk hen, and
he obtained similar results ; for he thus raised, besides a
black hen, seven cocks, all of wdiich were dark bodied with
more or less orange-red hackles. In the ensuing year he
paired the black hen . with one of her brothers, and raised
three young cocks, all coloured like their father, and a black
hen mottled with white.
The hens from the six above-described crosses showed
liMi'dly any tendency to revert to the mottled- brown plumage
of the female G. hanldva : one hen, however, from the white
Co(3hin, which was at first coai-black, became slightly brown
or sooty. Se\eral hens, which were for a long time snow-
Chap. VII. REVEESION AND ANALOGOUS REVERSION. 255
white, acquired as they grew old a few black feathers. A
hen from the white Game, which was for a long time entirely
black glossed with green, when two j^ears old had some of
the primary wing feathers greyish- white, and a multitude of
feathers over her body narrowly and symmetrically tipped or
laced with white. 1 had expected that some of the chickens
whilst covered with down would have assumed the longi-
tudinal >:tripes so general with gallinaceous birds ; but this
did not occur in a single instance. Two or three alone 'were
reddish-brown about their heads. I was unfortunate in
losing nearly all the white chickens from the first crosses ;
so that black prevailed with the grandchildren ; but they
were much diversified in colour, some being sooty, others
mottled, and one blackish chicken had its feathers oddly
tipped and barred with brown.
I will here add a few miscellaneous facts connected with
reversion, and with the law of analogous variation. This
law implies, as stated in a previous chapter, that the varieties
of one species frequently mock distinct but allied S23ecies ;
and this fact is explained, according to, the views which I
maintain, on the principle of allied species having descended
from one primitive form. The white Silk fowl with black
skin and bones degenerates, as has been observed by Mr.
Hewitt and Mr. h. Orton, in our climate; that is, it reverts
to the ordinary colour of the common fowl in its skin and
bones, due care having been taken to prevent any cross. In
Germany^® a distinct breed with black bones, and with
black, not silky plumage, has likewise been observed to
degenerate.
Mr. Tegetmeier informs me that, when distinct breeds are
crossed, fowls are frequently produced with their feathers
marked or pencilled by narrow transverse lines of a darker
colour. This may be in part explained by direct reversion to
the parent-form, the Bankiva hen ; for this bird has all its
upper plumage finely mottled with dark and rufous brown,
‘ Die Hlihner- und Pfauenzucht,’’ W, B. Tegetmeier, 1866, p. 222. I am
Ulm, 1827, s. 17. For Mr. Hewitt’s indebted to Mr. Orton for a letter on
statement with respect to the white the same subject.
Silk fowl, see the ‘ Poultry Book,’ by
256
FOWLS.
Chap. VTl
with the mottling partiallj^ and ohscnrely arranged in trans-
verse lines. But the tendency to pencilling is probably
much strengthened by the law of analogous variation, for the
hens of some other species of Gallus are more plainly pencilled,
and the hens of many gallinaceous birds belonging to other
genera, as the partridge, have pencilled feathers. Mr. Teget-
meier has also remarked to me that, although with domestic
pigeons we have so great a diversity of colouring, we never
see either pencilled or spangled feathers ; and this fact is
intelligible on the law of analogous variation, as neither the
wild rock pigeon nor any closely allied species has such
feathers. The frequent appearance of pencilling in crossed
birds probably accounts for the existence of “cuckoo” sub-
breeds in the Game, Polish, Dorking, Cochin, Andalusian,
and Bantam breeds. The plumage of these birds is slaty-
blue or grey, with each feather transversely barred with
darker lines, so as to resemble in some degree the plumage
of the cuckoo. It is a singular fact, considering that the
male of no species of Gallus is in the least barred, that the
cuckoo -like plumage has often been transferred to the male,
more especially in the cuckoo Dorking ; and the fact is all the
more singular, as in gold- and silver-pencilled Hamburghs,
in which pencilling is characteristic of the breed, the male is
hardly at all pencilled, this kind of plumage being confined to
the female.
Another case of analogous variation is the occurrence of
spangled sub-breeds of Hamburgh, Polish, Malay, and Bantam
fowls. Spangled feathers have a dark mark, properly crescent-
shaped, on their tips ; whilst pencilled feathers have several
transverse bars. ■ Tfie spangling cannot be due to reversion to
G. hanhiva ; nor does it often follow, as I hear from Mr. Teget-
meier, from crossing distinct breeds ; but it is a case of
analogous variation, for many gallinaceous birds have spangled
feathers, — for instance, the common pheasant. Hence spangled
breeds are often called “ pheasant ’’-fowls. Another case of
analogous variation in several domestic breeds is inexplicable ;
it is, that the chickens, whilst covered with down, of the
black Spanish, black Game, black Polish, and black Bantam,
all have whi te throats and breasts, and often have some white
Chap. VII- llEVEKSION AND ANALOGOUS VARIATION. 257
Oil their wings.^^ The editor of the ‘ Poultry Chronicle
remarks that all the breeds which properly have red ean
lappets occasionally produce birds with white ear- lappets.
This remark more especially applies to the Game breed,
which of all comes nearest to the G. hankiva ; and we have
seen that with this species living in a state of nature, the
ear-lappets vary in colour, being red in the Malayan countries,
and generally, but not invariably, white in In^.
In concluding this part of my subject, I may repeat
that there exists one widely-ranging, varying, and common
species of Gallus, namely, G. hankiva, which can be tamed,
produces fertile offspring when crossed with common fowls,
and closely resembles in its whole structure, plumage, and
voice the Game breed ; hence it may be safely ranked as the
parent of this, the most typical domesticated breed. We
have seen that there is much difficulty in believing that
other, now unknown, species have been the parents of the
other domestic breeds. We know that all the breeds are
most closely allied, as shown by their similarity in most
points of structure and in habits, and by the analogous
manner in which they vary. We have also seen that several
of the most distinct breeds occasionally or habitually closely
resemble in plumage G. hankiva, and that the crossed offspring
of other breeds, which are not thus coloured, show a stronger
or weaker tendency to revert to this same plumage. Some of
the breeds, which appear the most distinct and the least likely
to have proceeded from G. hankiva, such as Polish fowls, with
their protuberant and little ossified skulls, and Cochins, with
their imperfect tail and small wings, bear in these characters
the plain marks of their artificial origin. We know well that
of late years methodical selection has greatl}^ improved and
fixed many characters ; and we have every reason to believe
that unconscious selection, carried on for many generations,
will have steadily augmented each new peculiarity, and thus
have given rise to new breeds. As soon as two or three
breeds were once formed, crossing would come into play in
Dixon, ‘ Ornamental and Do- ‘ Prize Poultry,’ p. 260.
mestic Poultry,’ pp. 253, 324, 335. i Poultry Chronicle,’ vol. ii.
For game fowls, see Ferguson on 71.
18
258
FOWLS.
ClIAl>. VI I
changing their character and in increasing their nnmher
Brahma Bootras, according to an account lately published in
America, offer a good instance of a breed, . lately formed by
a cross, which can be truly propagated. The well-known
Sebright Bantams offer another and similar instance. Hence
it may be concluded that not only the Game-breed but that
all our breeds are probably the descendants of the Malayan
or Indian variety of G. hanldva. If so, this species has varied
greatly since it was first domesticated; but theie has been
ample time, as we shall now show.
History of the Fowl. — Riitimeyer found no remains of the
fowl in the ancient Swiss lake-dwellings ; but, according to
Jeitteles,^^ such have certainly since been found associated
with extinct animals and prehistoric remains. It is, there-
fore a strange fact that the fowl is not mentioned in the Old
Testament, nor figured on the ancient^ Egyptian monuments.
It is not referred to by Homer or Hesiod (about 900 b.c.) ;
but is mentioned by Theognis and Aristophanes between
400 and 500 b.c. It is figured on some of the Babylonian
cylinders, between the sixth and seventh centuries b.c., of
which Mr. Layard sent me an impression ; and on the Harpy
Tomb in Lycia, about 600 b.c. : so that the fowl apparently
reached Europe in a domesticated condition somewhere about
the sixth century b.c. It had travelled still farther westward
by the time of the Christian era, for it was found in Britain
‘ Die vorgeschichtlichen Alter-
thiimei’,’ II. Theil, 1872, p. 5. Dr.
Pickering, in his ‘ Races of Man,’
1850, p. 874, says that the head and
neck of a fowl is carried in a Tribute-
procession to Thoutmousis III. (1445
B.C.) ; but Mr. Birch of the British
Museum doubts whether the figure
can be identified as the .head of a
fowl. Some caution is necessary with
reference to the absence of figures
of the fowl on the ancient Egyptian
monuments, on account of the strong
and widely prevalent prejudice against
this bird. I am informed by the
Rev. S. Erhardt that on the east coast
of Africa, from 4° to 6° south of the
equator, most of the pagan tribes at
the present day hold the fowl in
aversion. The natives of the Pel lew
Islands would not eat the fowl, nor will
the Indians in some parts of S.
America. For the ancient history of
the fowl, see also Volz, ‘ Beitrage zur
Culturgeschichte,’ 1852, s. 77; and
Isid. Geoffroy St. -Hilaire, ‘ Hist. Nat
Gen.,’ tom. iii. p. 61. Mr. Crawfurd
has given an admirable history of the
fowl in his paper ‘ On the Relation
of Domesticated Animals to Civilisa-
tion,’ read before the Brit. Assoc, at
Oxford in 1860, and since printed
separately. I quote from him on the
Greek poet Theognis, and on the
Harpy Tomb described by Sir C.
Fellowes. I quote from a letter of
Mr. Blyth’s with respect to the Insti-
tutes of Mann.
CilAP. VII.
THEIR HISTORY.
259
by Julius Caisar. In India it must have been domesticated
when tlie Institutes of Manu were written, that is, according
to iSir W. Jones, 1 200 b.g., but, according to the later authority
of Mr. H. Wilson, only 800 b.c., for the domestic fowl is
forbidden, whilst the wild is permitted to be eaten. If, as
before remarked, we may trust the old Chinese Encyclopasdia,
the fowl must have been domesticated several centuries
earlier, as it is said to have been introduced from the West
into China 1400 b.g.
Sufficient materials do not exist for tracing the history
of the separate breeds. About the commencement of the
Christian era. Columella mentions a five-toed fighting breed,
and some provincial breeds ; but we know nothing about
them. He also alludes to dwarf fowls ; but these cannot
have been the same with our Bantams, which, as Mr.
Crawfurd has shown, were imported from Japan into Bantam
in Java. A dwarf fowl, probably the true Bantam, is re-
ferred to in an old Japanese Encyclopeedia, as I am informed
by Mr. Birch. In the Chinese Encyclopfedia published in
1590, but comjiiled from various sources, some of high
antiquity, seven breeds are mentioned, including what we
should now call Jumpers or Creepers, and likewise fowls with
black feathers, bones, and flesh. In 1600 Aldrovandi de-
scribes seven or eight breeds of fowls, and this is the most
ancient record from which the age of our European breeds
can be inferred. The Gallus turcicvs certainly seems to be a
pencilled Hamburgh ; but Mr. Brent, a most capable judge,
thinks that Aldrovandi “evidently figured what he happened
to see, and not the best of the breed.” Mr. Brent, indeed,
consider^ all Aldrovandi ’s fowls as of impure breed ; but it is
a far more probable view that all our breeds have been much
improved and modified since bis time; for, as he went to the
expense of so many figures, he probably would have secured
characteristic specimens. The Silk fowl, however, probably
then existed in its present state, as did almost certainly the
fowl with frizzled or reversed feathers. Mr. Dixon considers
‘ Ornamental aud Domestic Poul- 312. For Golden Hamburghs, see
try,’ 1847, p. 185 ; for passages Aloin's ‘ Natural History of Birds,
translated from Columella, see p. 3 vols., with plates 1731-38
FOWLS.
Chap. VII,
2ryj
Aldrovaiidi’s Paduan fowl as “ a variety of the Polish, ”
whereas Mr. Brent believes it to have been more nearly allied
to the Malay. The anatomical peculiarities of the skull of the
Polish breed were noticed by P. Borelli in 1056. I may add
that in 1737 one Polish sub-breed, viz., the Golden-spaugled,
was known ; but judging from Albin’s description, the comb
was then larger, the crest of feathers much smaller, the breast
more coarsely spotted, and the stomach and thighs much
blacker: a Golden-spangled Polish fowl in this condition
would now be of no value.
Differences in external and Internal Structure between the
Breeds: Individual Variability. — Fowls have been exposed to
diversified conditions of life, and as we have just seen there
has been ample time for much variability and for the slow
action of unconscious selection. As there are good grounds
for believing that all the breeds are descended from Gallus
hankiva, it will be worth while to describe in some detail the
chief points of difference. Beginning with the eggs and
chickens, I will pass on to their secondary sexual characters,
and then to their differences in external structure and in the
skeleton. I enter on the following details chiefly to show
how variable almost every character has become under
domestication.
Eggs. — Mr. Dixon remarks that ‘‘to every hen belongs an
individual peculiarity in the form, colour, and size of her egg, which
never changes during her life-time, so long as she remains in
health, and which is as well known to those who are in the habit of
taking her produce, as the hand-writing of their nearest acquain-
tance.” I believe that this is generally true, and that, if no great
number of hens be kept, the eggs of each can almost always be re-
cognised. The eggs of differently sized breeds naturally differ much
in size ; but apparently, not always in strict relation to the size of
the hen : thus the Malay is a larger bird than the Spanish, but
generally she produces not such large eggs; white Bantams are
said to lay smaller eggs than other Bantams white Cochins, on
the other hand, as I hear from Mr. Tegetmeier, certainly lay larger
eggs than buff Cochins. The eggs, howeyer, of the different breeds
‘ Ornamental and Dcmestic Poul-
try,’ p. 152.
36 iTerguson on ‘ Rare Prize Poul-
try,’ p. 297 This writer, I am
informed, cannot generally be trustol
He gives, however, figures and mu( li
information on eggs. See pp. 34 and
235 on the eggs of the. Game fowl.
CuAP. VIL DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THE BREEDS.
261
vary considerably in character ; for instance, Mr. Ballance states
that his Malay “ pullets of last year laid eggs eqnal in size to those
of any duck, and other Malay hens, two or three years old, laid
eggs very little larger than a good sized Bantam’s egg. Some were
as white as a SiDanish hen’s egg, and others varied from a light cream-
colour to a deep rich buff, or even to a brown.” The shape also
varies, the two ends being much more equally rounded in Cochins
than in Games or Polish. Spanish fowls lay smoother eggs than
Cochins, of which the eggs are generally granulated. The shell in
this latter breed, and more especially in Malays is apt to be thicker
than in Games or Spanish ; but the Minorcas, a sub-breed of Spanish,
are said to lay harder eggs than true Spanish.®® Tbe colour difCers
considerably, — the Cochins laying buff-coloured eggs ; the Malays a
paler variable buff; and Games a still paler buff. It would appear
that darker-coloured eggs characterise the breeds which have lately-
come from the East, or are still closely allied to those now living
there. The colour of the yolk, according to Ferguson, as well as of
the shell, differs slightly in the sub-breeds of the Game. I am
also informed by Mr. Brent that dark partridge-coloured Cochin
hens lay darker coloured eggs than the other Cochin sub-breeds.
The flavour and richness of the egg certainly differ in different
breeds. The productiveness of the several breeds is very different.
Spanish, Polish, and Hamburgh hens have lost the incubating
instinct.
Chickens. — As the young of almost all gallinaceous birds, even of
the black curassow and black grouse, whilst covered with down, are
longitudinally striped on the back, — of which character, when adult,
neither sex retains a trace, — it might have been expected that the
chickens of all our domestic fowls would have been similarly
striped.®® This could, however, hardly have been expected, when
the adult plumage in both sexes has undergone so great a change
as to be wholly white or black. In white fowls of various breeds the
chickens are uniformly yellowish white, passing in the black-boned
Silk fowl into bright canary-yellow. This is also generally the
case with the chickens of white Cochins, but I hear from Mr. Zmliost
that they are sometimes of a buff or oak colour, and that all those
of this latter colour, which were watched, turned out males. The
chickens of buff Cochins are of a golden-yellow, easily distinguishable
from the paler tint of the white Cochins, and are often longitudinally
See ‘ Poultry Book,’ by Mr.
Tegctmeier, 1866, pp. 81 and 78.
‘ The Cottage Gardener,’ Oct.
1855, p. 13. On the thinness of the
eggs of Game-fowls, see Mowbray on
Poultry, 7th edit., p. 13.
My information, which is very
far from perfect, on chickens in the
down, is derived chiefly from Mr.
Dixon’s ‘ Ornamental and Domestic
Poultry.’ Mr. B. P. Brent has also
communicated to me many facts by
letter, as has Mr. Tegetmeier. I will
in each case mark my authority by
the name within brackets. For the
chickens of white Silk-fowls, sec
Tegetmeier’s ‘Poultry Book,’ 1866, p
221.
262
FOWLS.
Chai>. VIL
streaked with dark shades: the chickens of silver-cinnamon
Cochins are almost always of a bnff colour. The chickens of the
white Game and white Dorking breeds, when held in particular
lights, sometimes exhibit (on the authority of Mr. Brent) faint traces
of longitudinal stripes. Fowls which are entirely black, namely,
Spanish, black Game, black Polish, and black Bantams, display a
new character, for their chickens have their breasts and throats
7iiore or less white, with sometimes a little white elsewhere.
Spanish chickens also, occasionally (Brent), have, where the down
sras white, their first true feathers tipped for a time Avith white.
The primordially striped character is retained by the chickens of
most of the Game sub-breeds (Brent, Dixon) ; by Dorkings ; by the
partridge and grouse-coloured sub-breeds of Cochins (Brent), but
not, as we have seen, by the sub-breeds ; by the pheasant-Malay
(Dixon), but apparently not (at which 1 am much surprised) by
other Malays. The following breeds and sub-breeds are barely, or
not at all, longitudinally striped: viz., gold and silver pencilled
Hamburghs, which can hardly be distinguished from each other
(Brent) in the down, both having a few dark spots on the head and
rump, with occasionally a longitudinal stripe (Dixon) on the back of
the neck. 1 have seen only one chicken of the silver-spangled
Hamburgh, and this was obscurely striped along the back. Gold-
spangled Polish chickens (Tegetmeier) are of a warm russet brown ;
and silver- spangled Polish chickens are grey, sometimes (Dixon)
with dashes of ochre on the head, wings, and breast. Cuckoo and
blue-dun fowls (Dixon) are grey in the down. The chickens of
Sebright Bantams (Dixon) are uniformly dark brown, whilst those
of the brown-breasted red Game Bantam are black, with some white
on the throat and breast. From these facts we see that young
chickens of the different breeds, and even of the same main breed,
differ much in their downy plumage ; and, although longitudinal
stripes characterise the young of all wild gallinaceous birds, they
disappear in several domestic breeds. Perhaps it may be accepted
as a general rule that the more the adult plumage differs from that
of the adult G. hankiua, the more completely the chickens have
lost their stripes.
With respect to the period of life at which the characters
proper to each breed first appear, it is obvious that such
structures as additional toes must be formed long before birth.
In Polish fowls, the extraordinary protuberance of the anterior
part of the skull is well developed before the chickens come
out of the egg;^° but the crest, which is supported on the
j^rotuberance, is at first feebly developed, nor does it attain
As I hear from Mr. Tegetmeier ; crest, see ‘Poultry Chronicle,’ vcL
see also ‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.’ 1356, p. ii. p. 132.
366. On the late development of the
Chap. VII.
SEXUAL DIFFERENCES.
263
its full size until the second j^ear. The Spanish cock is pre-
eminent for his magnificent comb, and this is developed at
an unusually early age; so that the young males can be
distinguished from the females 'when only a few weeks old,
and therefore earlier than in other breeds ; they likewise
crow very early, namely, when about six weeks old. In the
Dutch sub-breed of tlie Spanish fowl the white ear-la]: pets
are developed earlier than in the common Spanish breed.
Cochins are characterised by a small tail, and in the young
cocks the tail is developed at an unusually late period.^^
Game fowls are notorious for their pugnacity ; and the young
cocks crow, clap their little wings, and fight obstinately with
each other, even whilst under their mother’s care.'^^ “ I have
often had,” says one author, “ whole broods, scarcely
feathered stone blind from fighting ; the rival couples moping
in corners, and renewing their battles on obtaining the first
ray of light. ’ The weapons and pugnacity of all male gallina-
ceous birds evidently serve the purpose of gaining possession of
the females ; so that the tendency in our Game chickens to fight
at an extremely early age is not only useless, but injurious,
as they suffer much from their wounds. The training for
battle during an early age may be natural to the wild Gallus
hankiva; but as man during many generations has gone on
selecting the most obstinately pugnacious cocks, it is more
probable that their pugnacity has been unnaturally increased,
and unnaturally transferred to the young male chickens. In
the same manner, it is probable that the extraordinary de-
velopment of the comb in the Spanish cock has been un-
intentionally transferred to the young cocks; for fancieis
would not care whether their young birds had large combs,
but would select for breeding the adults which had the finest
combs, whether or not developed at an early period. The
last point which need here be noticed is that, though the
chickens of Spanish and Malay fowls are well covered with
down, the true feathers are acquired at an unusually late age;
On these points, see ‘Poultry tic Poultry,’ p. 273,
Chronicle,’ vol. iii. p. 166 ; and Teget- Ferguson on Rare and Prize
meier’s ‘ Poultry Book,’ 1866, pp. 105 Poultry, p. 261.
and 121. ** Mowbray on Poultry, 7th edit.
Dixon, ‘Ornamental and Domes- 1834, p. 13.
FOWLS.
Chap. VLI.
20 [
so that for a time the young birds are partially naked, and
are liable to suffer from cold.
Secondary Sexual Characters. — The two sexes in the parent-
form, the Galliis hanhiva, differs much in colour. In our
domestic breeds the difference is never greater-, but is often
less, and varies much in degree even in the sub- breeds of the
same main breed. Thus in certain Game fowls the difference
is as great as in the parent-form, whilst in the black and
white sub-breeds there is no difference in plumage. Mr. Brent
informs me that he has seen two strains of black-breasted red
Games, of which the cocks could not be distinguished, whilst
the hens in one were partridge-brown and in the other fawn-
Ijrown. A similar case has been observed in the strains of
the brown-breasted red Game. The hen of the duck-winged
Game” is -‘extremely beautiful,” and differs much from the
liens of all the other Game sub-breeds ; but generally, as with
the blue and grey Game and with some sub-varieties of the
pile game, a moderately close relation may be observed
between the males and females in the variation of their
plumage.^^ A similar relation is also evident when we com-
pare the several varieties of Cochins. In the two sexes of
gold and silver-spangled and of buff Polish fowls, there is
much general similarity in the colouring and marks of the
whole plumage, excepting of course in the hackles, crest, and
beard. In spangled Hamburghs, there is likewise a con-
siderable degree of similarity between the two sexes. In
pencilled Hamburghs, on the other hand, there is much dis-
similarity ; the pencilling which is characteristic of the hens
being almost absent in the males of both the golden and
silver varieties. But, as we have already seen, it cannot be
given as a general rule that male fowls never have pencilled
feathers, for Cuckoo Dorkings are “remarkable from having
nearly similar markings in both sexes.”
It is a singular fact that the males in certain sub breeds
have lost some of their secondary masculine characters, and
from their close resemblage in plumage to the females, ai-e
often called hennies. There is much diversity of o])inion
whether these males are in any degree sterile ; that they some-
See the full description of the meier’s ‘ Poultry Book,’ 1866, p 131.
varieties of the Game-breed, in Teq;et- For Cuckoo Doi-kin<js, p. 97.
CnAr. VII.
SEXUAL DIFFERENCES.
265
times are partially sterile seems clear, but this may have
been caused by too close interbreeding. That they are not
quite sterile, and that the whole case is widely dilferent from
that of old females assuming masculine characters, is evident
from several of these hen-like sub-breeds having been long
propagated. The males and females of gold and silver-laced
Sebright Bantams can be barely distinguished from each
other, except by their combs, wattles, and spurs, for they are
coloured alike, and the males have not hackles, nor the
flowing sickle-like tail-feathers. A hen-tailed sub-breed of
Hamburghs was recently much esteemed. There is also a
breed of Game-fowls, in which the males and females resemble
each other so closely that the cocks have often mistaken their
hen- feathered opponents in the cock- pit for real hens, and by
the mistake have lost their lives.^^ The cocks, though
dressed in the feathers of the hen, “ are high-spirited birds,
and their courage has been often proved : ” an engraving
even has been published of one celebrated hen-tailed victor.
Mr. Tegetmeier has recorded the remarkable case of a
brown-breasted red Game cock which, after assuming its
perfect masculine plumage, became hen-feathered in the
autumn of the following year; but he did not lose voice,
spurs, strength, nor productiveness. This bird has now
retained the same character during five seasons, and has
begot both hen-feathered and male-feathered offspring. Mr.
Grantley F. Berkeley relates the still more singular case of a
celebrated strain of “ polecat Game fowls,” which produced in
nearly every brood a single hen-cock. “ The great peculiarity
in one of these birds was that he, as the seasons succeeded
each other, was not always a hen-cock, and not always of the
colour called the polecat, which is black. From the polecat
and hen-cock feather in one season he moulted to a full malo-
plumaged black-breasted red, and in the following year he
returned to the former feather.”
Mr. Hewitt la Tegetmeier’s a-dozen cocks thus sacrificed.
‘ Poultry Book,’ 1866, pp. 246 and ■‘® ‘ Proceedings of Zoolog. Soc.’
156. For hen-tailed game-cocks, se& March, 1861, p. 1U2. The engraving
p. 131. of the hen-tailed cock just alluded to
‘The Field,’ April 20th, 1861. was exhibited before the Society.
The writer says he has seen half- ‘ The Field,’ April 20th, 1861.
266
FOWLS.
Chap VII,
I haAe remarked in my ‘ Origin of Species’ that secondary
sexual characters are apt to differ much in the species of the
same genus, and to be unusually variable in the individuals
of the same species. So it is with the breeds of the fowl, as
we have already seen, as far as the colour of plumage is con-
cerned, and so it is with the other secondary sexual charactei's.
Firstly, the comb differs much in the various breeds, and its
form is eminently characteristic of each kind, with the
exception of the Dorkings, in which the form has not been as
yet determined on by fanciers, and fixed by selection. A single,
deeply- serrated comb is the typical and most common form.
It differs much in size, being immensely developed in Spanish
fowls ; and in a local breed called Ked-caps, it is sometimes
“ upwards of three inches in breadth at the front, and more
than four inches in length, measured to the end of the peak
behind.” In some breeds the comb is d(mble, and when the
two ends are cemented together it forms a “ cup-comb ; ” in
the “rose comb” it is depressed, covered with small pro-
jections, and produced backwards ; in the horned and creve-
cxur fowl it is produced into two horns ; it is triple in the
pea-combed Brahmas, short and truncated in the Malays,
and absent in the Guelderlands. In the tasselled Game a few
long feathers rise from the back of the comb : in many breeds
a crest of feathers replaces the comb. The crest, when little
develoj)ed, arises from a fleshy mass, but, when much deve-
loped, from a hemispherical protuberance of the skull. In
the best Polish fowls it is so largely developed, that I have
seen birds which could hardly pick up their food ; and a
German writer asserts that they are in consequence liable
to be struck by hawks. Monstrous structures of this kind
would thus be suppressed in a state of nature. The wattles,
also, vary much in size, being small in Malays and some
other breeds ; in certain Polish sub-breeds they are replaced
by a great tuft of feathers called a beard.
The hackles do not differ much in the various breeds, but
1 am much indebted to Mr. Brent
for an account, with sketches, of all
the variations of the comb known to
nim, and likewise with respect to the
tail as presently to be given.
The ‘ Poultry Book,’ by Teget-
meior, 1866, p. 234,
‘ Die Hiihner- und Pfaueuzuoht,
1827, s. 11.
CiiAi‘. Yll.
SEXUAL DIFFEKENCES.
267
are-ssiliort and stiff in Malays, and absent in Hennies. As in
some orders male birds display extraordinarily- shaped feathers,
such as naked shafts with discs at the end, &c., the following
case may be worth giving. In the wild Gallus bankiva and in
onr domestic fowls, the barbs which arise from each side of
the extremities of the hackles are naked or not clothed with
barbules, so that they resemble bristles ; bnt Mr. Brent sent
me some scapular hackles from a young Birchen Duckwing
Game cock, in which the naked barbs became densely re-
clothed with barbules towards their tips ; so that these tips,
which were dark coloured with a metallic lustre, were sepa-
rated from the lower parts by a symmetrically- shaped trans-
parent zone formed of the naked portions of the barbs. Hence
the coloured tips appeared like little separate metallic discs.
The sickle-feathers in the tail, of which there are three
j)air, and which are eminently characteristic of the male sex,
differ much in the various breeds. They are scimitar-shaped
in some Hamburghs, instead of being long and flowing as in
the typical breeds, d'hey are extremely short in Cochins,
and are not at all developed in Hennies. They are carried,
together with the whole tail, erect in Dorkings and Games ;
but droop much in Mahays and in some Cochins. Sultans are
characterised by an additional number of lateral sickle -
feathers. The spurs vary much, being placed higher or loxrer
on the shank ; being extremely long and sharp in Games, and
blunt and short in Cochins. These latter birds seem aware
that their spurs are not efficient weapons ; for though they
occasionally use them, they more frequently fight, as I am
informed by Mr. Tegetmeier, by seizing and shaking each
other with their beaks In .some Indian Game cocks, received
by Mr. Brent from Germany, there are, as he informs me,
three, four, or even five spurs on each leg. Some Dorkings
also have two spurs on each leg ; and in birds of this breed
the spur is often placed almost on the outside of the leg.
Double spurs are mentioned in an ancient Chinese Ency-
clopaedia. Their occurrence may be considered as a case of
‘Poultry Chronicle,’ vol. l. p. position of the spurs in Dorkings,
t>9b. Mr. Brent has informed me of ‘Cottage Gardener,’ Sept. 18th, 18G0,
the same lact. With respect to the p. 380.
268
FOWIiS.
Chap. VII.
analogous variation, for some ’wild gallinaceous birds, for
instance, the Polyplectron, have double spurs.
Judging from the differences which generally distinguish
the sexes in the Gallinacese, certain characters in our domestic
fowls appear to have been transferred from the one sex to the
other. In all the species (except in Turnix), when there is
any conspicuous difference in plumage betw’een the male and
female, the male is always the most beautiful ; but in golden-
span gled Hamburghs the hen is equally beautiful with the
cock, and incomparably more beautiful than the hen in any
natural species of G alius ; so that here a masculine character
has been transferred to the female. On the other hand, in
Cuckoo Dorkings and in other cuckoo breeds the pencilling,
which in Gallus is a female attribute, has been transferred
to the male : nor, on the principle of analogous variation, is
this transference surprising, as the males in many gallinaceous
genera are barred or pencilled. With most of these birds
head ornaments of all kinds are more fully developed in the
male than in the female; but in Polish fowls the crest or
top knot, which in the male replaces the comb, is equally
developed in both sexes. In the males of certain other sub-
breeds, which from the hen having a small crest, are called
lark-crested, “ a single upright comb sometimes almost en-
tirely takes the place of the crest.” From this latter case,
and more especially from some facts presently to be given
with respect to the protuberance of the skull in Polish
fowls, the crest in this breed must be viewed as a feminine
character which has been transferred to the male. In the
Spanish breed the male, as we know, has an immense comb,
and this has been partially transferred to the female, for her
comb is unusually large, though not upright. In Game
fowls the bold and savage disposition of the male has like-
wise been largely transferred to the female ; and she some-
times even possesses the eminently masculine character of
spurs. Many cases are on record of fertile hens being furnished
Dixon, ‘ Ornamental and Domes- batire, that it is now _o-enerally the
Poultry,’ p. 320, practice to exhibit each hen iu a
Mr. Tegetmeier informs me that separate pen.
Game hens have been found so com-
CiiAr. TII.
EXTERNAL DIFFERENCES.
269
with spurs; and in Germany, according to Bechstein,^*^ the
spurs in the Silk hen are sometimes very long. He mentions
also another breed similarly characterised, in which the hens
are excellent layers, but are apt to disturb and break their
eggs owing to their spurs.
Mr. Layard^"^ has given an account of a breed of fowls in
Ceylon with black skin, bones, and wattle, but with ordinary
feathers, and which cannot “ be more aptly described than''by
comparing them to a white fowl drawn down a sooty chimney ;
it is, however,” adds Mr. Layard, “ a remarkable fact that a
male bird of the pure sooty variety is almost as rare as a
tortoise-shell tom-cat.” Mr. Blyth found the same rule to
hold good with this breed near Calcutta. The males and
females, on the other hand, of the black-boned European
breed, with silky feathers, do not differ from each other ; so
that in the one breed, black skin and bones aud the same
kind of plumage are common to both sexes, whilst in the other
breed, these characters are confined to the female sex.
At the present day all the breeds of Polish fowls have the
great bony protuberance on their skulls, which includes part
of the brain and supports the crest, equally developed in both
sexes. But formerly in Germany the skull of the hen alone
was protuberant: Blumenbaoh,^® who particularly attended
to abnormal peculiarities in domestic animals, states, in 1805,
that this was the case ; and Bechstein had previously, in
1793, observed the same fact. This latter author has care-
fully described the effects on the skull of a crest not only in
the case of fowls, but of ducks, geese, and canaries. He states
that with fowls, when the crest is not much developed, it is
supported on a fatty mass ; b^t when much developed, it is
always supported on a bony protuberance of variable size.
‘ Naturge.schichte Deutschlauds,’
Band iii. (1793), s. 339, 407.
On the Ornitholog}’- of Ceylon in
‘Annals and Mag. of Nat. History.’
2nd series, vol. xiv. (1 854), p. 63.
‘ Ilandbuch der vergleich. Ana-
toinie,’ 1805, p. 85, note. Mr. Teget-
ineier, who gives in ‘ Proc. Zoolog.
Soc.,’ Nov. 25th, 1856, a very interest-
ing account of the skulls of Polish
fowls, not knowing of Bechstein’s ac-
count, has disputed the accuracy of
Blumenbach’s statement. For Bech-
stein, sec ‘ Naturgeschichte Deutsch-
lands,’ Band iii. (1793), s. 399, note. I
may add that at the first exhibition of
Poultry at the Zoological Gardens, in
May, 1845, I saw some fowls, called
Priezland fowls, of which the hens
were crested, and the cocks furnished
with a comb.
270
FOWLS.
Chap. VII.
Ho well describes the peculiarities of this protuhci-ance ; ho
attended also to the effects of the modified sliapc of the brain
on the intellect of these birds, and disputes I’allas’ statement
that they are stupid. He then expressly remarks that he
never observed this protuberance in male fowls. Hence there
can be no doubt that this extraordinary character in the skulhi
of Polish fowls was formerly in Germany confined to the
female sex, but has now been transferred to the males, and
has thus become common to both sexes.
External Differences, not connected with the Sexes, between the
Breeds and between individual Birds.
The size of the body differs greatly. Mr. Tegetmeier has known
a Brahma to weigh 17 pounds; a fine Malay cock 10 pounds; whilst
a first-rate Sebright Bantam weighs hardly more than 1 pound.
During the last 20 years the size of some of our breeds has been
largely increased by methodical selection, whilst that of other breeds
has been much diminished. We have already seen how greatly
colour varies even within the same breed; we know that the wild
G. hankiva varies slightly in colour ; we know that colour is variable
in all our domestic animals ; nevertheless some eminent fanciers
have so little faith in variability, that they have actually argued
that the chief Game sub-breeds, which differ from ench other in
nothing but colour, are descended from distinct wild species!
Crossing often causes strange modification of colour. Mr. Tegetmeier
informs me that when buff and white Cochins are crossed, some of
the chickens are almost invariably black. According to Mr. Brent,
black and white Cochins occasionally produce chickens of a slaty-
blue tint ; and this same tint results, as Mr. Tegetmeier tells me,
from crossing white Cochins with black Spanish fowls, or white
Dorkings with black Minorcas.®^ A good observer*^® states that a
first-rate silver- spangled Hamburgh hen gradually lost the most
characteristic qualities of the breed, for the black lacing to her
feathers disappeared, and her legs changed from leaden-blue to white :
but what makes the case remarkable is, that this tendency ran in the
blood for her sister changed in a similar but less strongly marked
manner ; and chickens produced from this latter hen were at first
almost pure white, “but on moulting acquired black colours and
some spangled feathers with almost obliterated markings so that
a new variety arose in this singular manner. The skin in the
different breeds differs much in colour, being white in common kinds,
yellow in Malays and Cochins, and black in Silk fowls ; thus mocking,
‘Cottage Gardener,’ Jan. 3rd, before the Dublin Nat.. Hist. Soc.,
I860, p. 218. quoted in ‘Cottage Gardener,’ 1856,
Mr. Williams, in a paper read p. 161.
CUAP. VII.
EXTEEN AL DIFFEEENCES.
271
as M. Godron remarks the three principal types of skin in man-
kind. The same author adds that, as different kinds of fowls living
in distant and isolated parts of the world have black skin and bones,
this colour must have appeared at various times and places.
The shape and carriage of the body, and the shape of the head
differ much. The beak varies slightly in leugth and curvature, but
incomparably less than with pigeons. In most crested fowds the
nostrils offer a remarkable peculiarity in being raised with a cres-
centic outline. The primary wing-feathers are short in Cochins ; in
a male, which must have been more than twice as heavy a& G.
oankiva, these feathers were in both birds of the same length. I
have counted, with Mr. Tegetmeier’s aid, the primary wing-feathers
in thirteen cocks and hens of various breeds ; in four of them,
namely in two Hamburghs, a Cochin, and Game bantam, there v/ere
10, instead of the normal number 9 ; but in counting these feathers
I have followed the practice of fanciers, and have not included the
first minute primary feather, barely three-quarters of an inch in
length. These feathers differ considerably in relative length, the
fourth, or the fifth, or the sixth, being the longest ; with the third
either equal to, or considerably shorter than the fifth. In wild
gallinaceous species the relative length and number of the main
wing and tail-feathers are extremely constant.
The tail differs much in eroctness and size, being small in Malays
and very small in Cochins. In thirteen fowls of various breeds
which I have examined, five had the normal number of 14 feathers,
including in this number the two middle sickle-feathers; six others
(viz. a Caffre cock, Gold-spangled Polish cock, Cochin hen, Sultan
hen. Game hen and Malay hen had 16 ; and two (an old Cochin
cock and Malay hen) had 17 feathers. The rumpless fowl has no tail
and in one which I possessed there was no oil-gland ; but this
bird though the os coccygis was extremely imperfect, had a vestige
of a tail with two rather long feathers in the position of the outer
caudals. This bird came from a family where, as I was told, the
breed had kept true for twenty years ; but rumpless fowls often
produce chickens with tails.*^^ An eminent physiologist®^ has
recently spoken of this breed as a distinct species ; had he examined
the deformed state of the os coccyx he would never have come to
this conclusion ; he was probably misled by the statement, which may
be found in some works, that tailless fowls are wild in Ceylon ; but
this statement, as I have been assured by Mr. Layard and Dr. Kellaert
who have so closely studied the birds of Ceylon, is utterly false.
The tarsi vary considerably in length, being relatively to the
‘ De I’Espfece,’ 1 859, p. 442.
For the occurrence of black-boned
fowls in South America, see Roulin,
In ‘Mem. de I’Acad. des Sciences,’
t'<rc. vi. p. 351 ; and Azara, ‘ Quad-
rupedes du Paraguay,’ tom. ii. p. 324.
A frizzled fowl sent to me from
Madras had black bones.
Mr. Hewitt, in Tegetmeier’s
‘Poultry Book,’ 1866, p. 231.
Dr. Broca, in Brown-Sequard’s
‘Journal de Phys.,’ tom. ii. p. 361.
272
FOWLS,
CiiAr. Vll.
femur considerably longer in the Spanish and Frizzled, and shorter
in the Silk and Bantam breeds, than in the wild G. hankiva ; but in
the latter, as we have seen, the tarsi vary in length. The tarsi are
often feathered. The feet in many breeds are furnished with
additional toes. Golden-spangled Polish fowls are said to have
t!ie skin between tlieir toes much developed: Mr. Tegetmeier
observed this in one bird, but it was not so in one which I examined.
Prof. Hoffmann has sent me a sketch of the feet of a fowl of the
common breed at Giessen, with a web extending between the three
toes,, for about a third of their length. In Cochins the middle toe is
said to be nearly double the length of the lateral toes, and there-
fore much longer than in G. hanhiva or in other fowls ; but this was
not the case in two which I examined. The nail of the middle toe
in this same breed is surprisingly broad and flat, but in a variable
degree in two birds which I examined ; of this structure in the nail
there is only a trace in G. hankiva.
The voice differs slightly, as I am informed by Mr. Dixon, in
almost every breed. The Malays have a loud, deep, somewhat pro-
longed crow, but with considerable individual difference. Colonel
Sykes remarks that the domestic Kulm cock in India has not the
shrill clear pipe of the English bird, and “ his scale of notes appears
more limited.” Dr. Hooker was struck with the “ prolonged howling
screech” of the cocks in Sikhim.®^ The crow of the Cochin is iioto-
riously and ludicrously different from that of the common cock.
The disposition of the different breeds is widely different, varying
from the savage and defiant temper of the Game-cock to the
extremely peaceable temper of the Cochins. The latter, it has been
asserted, ‘‘ graze to a much greater extent than any other varieties.’*
The Spanish fowls suffer more from frost than other breeds.
Before we pass on to the skeleton, the degree of distinctness
of the several breeds from G. hanhiva ought to be noticed.
Some writers speak of the Spanish as one of the most distinct
breeds, and so it is in general aspect ; but its characteristic
differences are not important. The Malay appears to me more
distinct, from its tall stature, small drooping tail with more
than fourteen tail-feathers, and from its small comb and
w attles ; nevertheless, one Malay sub-breed is coloured almost
exactly like G. hanhiva. Some authors consider the Polish
fowl as very distinct ; but this a semi-monstrous breed, as
shoMz-n by the protuberant and irregularly perforated skull.
Dixon’s ‘ Ornameiital Poultry,’
p. 325.
‘Poultry Chronicle,’ vol. i. p.
485. Tegetmeier’s ‘ Poultry Book,’
1866, p. 41. On Cochins grazing,
ibid., p. 46.
ofi Ferguson on ‘ Prize Poultry,’ p.
87.
Col. Sykes in ‘Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,
1832, p. 151. Dr. Hooker’s ‘Hima-
layan Journals,’ vol. i. p. 314.
Chap. YII.
OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFEKENCES.
273
The Cochin, from its deeply furrowed frontal bones, peculiarly
shaped occipital foramen, short wing-feathers, short tail con-
taining more than fourteen feathers, broad nail to the middle
toe, fluffy plumage, rough and dark-coloured eggs, and espe-
cially from its peculiar voice, is probably the most distinct of
all the breeds. If any one of our breeds has descended from
some unknown species, distinct from G. hankiva, it is probably
the Cochin ; but the balance of evidence does not favour -this
view. All the characteristic differences of the Cochin breed
are more or less variable, and may be detected in a greater or
lesser degree in other breeds. One sub-breed is coloured
closely like G. honkiva. The feathered legs, often furnished
with an additional toe, the wings incapable of flight, the
extremely quiet disposition, indicate a long course of domes
tication ; and these fowls come from China, where we know
that plants and animals have been tended from a remote
period with extraordinary care, and where consequently we
might expect to find profoundly modified domestic races.
Osteological Differences. — I have examined twenty-seven
skeletons and fifty-three skulls of various breeds, including
three of G. hankiva: nearly half of these skulls I owe to the
kindness of Mr. Tegetrneier, and three of the skeletons to
Mr. Eyton.
The Skull differs greatly in size in different breeds, being nearly
twice as long in the largest Cochins, but not nearly twice as broad,
as in Bantams. The bones at the base, from the occipital foramen
to the anterior end (including the guadrates and pterygoids), are
absolutely identical in shape in all the skulls. So is the lower jaw.
In the forehead slight differences are often jjerceptible between the
males and females, evidently caused by the presence of the comb.
In every case I take the skull of G. hankiva as the standard of
comparison. In four Games, in one Malay hen, in an African cock,
in a Frizzled cock from Madras, in two black-boned Silk hens, no
differences worth notice occur. In three Spanish cocks, the form
of the forehead between the orbits differs considerably ; in one it is
considerably depressed, whilst in the two others it is rather promi-
nent, with a deep medial furrow ; the skull of the hen is smooth.
In three skulls of Sebright Bantams the crown is more globular, and
slopes more abruptly to the occiput, than in O. hankiva. In a
Bantam or Jumper from Burmah these same characters are more
strongly pronounced, and the supra-occiput is more pointed. In
a black Bantam the skull is not so globular, and the occipibil
19
274
FOWLS.
Chap. VII.
foraipcu is very large, and has nearly the same snb-triangnlar out-
line presently to be described in Cochins; and in this skull the
two ascending branches of the premaxillary are overlapped in a
singular manner by the processes of the nasal bone, but, as I have
seen only one specimen, some of these differences may be individual.
Of Cochins and Brahmas (the latter a crossed race approaching
closely to Cochins) 1 have examined seven skulls; at the point
where the ascending branches of the premaxillary rest on the frontal
bone the surface is much depressed, and from this de]n‘ession a deep
medial furrow extends backwards to a variable distance; the edges
of this fissure are rather prominent, as is the top of the skull behind
and over the orbits. These characters are less developed in the
hens. The pterygoids, and the processes of the lower jaw, are
broader, relatively to the size of the head, than in O. hanhiva ; and
this is likewise the case with Dorkings when of large size. The
fork of the hyoid bone in Cochins is twice as wide as in G. hanldm,
whereas the length of the other hyoid bones is only as three to
two. But the most remarkable character is the shape of the
occipital foramen : in G. hankiva (A) the breadth in a horizontal
line exceeds the height in a vertical line, and the outline is nearly
circular ; whereas in Cochins (B) the outline is sub-triangular, and
the vertical line exceeds the horizontal line in length. This same
form likewise occurs in the black Bantam above referred to, and an
approach to it may be seen in some Dorkings, and in a slight degree
in certain other breeds.
Of Dorkings I have examined three skulls, one belonging to the
white-sub breed ; the one character deserving notice is the breadth
of the frontal bones, which are moderately furrowed in the middle ;
thus in a skull which was less than once and a half the length of
that of G. hankiva, the breadth between the orbits was exactly
double. Of Hamhurqlis I have examined four skulls (male and
female) of the pencilled sub-breed, and one (male) of the spangled sub-
breed; the nasal bones stand remarkably wide apart, but in a
variable degree; consequently narrow membrane-covered spaces
are left between the tips of the two ascending branches of the pre-
maxillary bones, which are rather short, and betw^een these branches
and the nasal bones. The surface of the frontal bone, on which the
Chap. VII.
OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFERENCES.
275
branches of the premaxillary rest, is Ycry little depressed. These
peculiarities no doubt stand in close relation with the broad, flattened
rose-comb characteristic of the Hamburgh breed.
I have examined fourteen skulls of I'oUsh and other created breeds.
Their differences are extraordinary. First for nine skulls of dif-
ferent sub-breeds of English Polish fowls. The hemispherical pro-
tuberance of the frontal bones may be seen in the accompanying
A
F’g. 31.- Skulls of natural size, viewed from above, a little obliquely. A. Wild Gallus
bankica. B. White created PoliahCock.
drawings, in which (B) the skull of a white-crested Polish fowl is
shown obliquely from above, with the skull (A) of 6r. hankiva in the
same position. In fig. 35 longitudinal sections are given of the
skull of a Polish fowl, and, for comparison, of a Cochin of the same
size. The protuberance in all Polish fowls occupies the same pc sition
but differs much in size. In one of my nine specimens it was ex-
tremely slight. The degree to which the protuberance is ossified
varies greatly, larger or smaller portions of bone being replaced by
membrane. In one specimen there was only a single open pore ;
See Mr. Tegetmeier’s account,
with woodcuts, of the skull of Polish
fowls, in ‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ Nov.
2r)th, 1856. For other references, see
Is’d. Geoffroy Saint- Hilaire, ‘Hist.
Gen. des Anomalies,’ tom. i. p, 287,
M. C. Dareste suspects (‘Recherche?
sur les Conditions de la Vie,’ &c.,
Lille, 1863, p. 36) that the protuber-
ance is not formed by the frontal
bones, but by the ossification of the
dura mater.
27(3
FOWLS.
Chai*. mi
generally, there are many variously shaped open spaces, the bone
forming an irregular reticulation. A medial, longitudinal, arched
ribbon of bone is generally retained, but in one specimen there was
no bone whatever over the whole protuberance, and the skull, when
cleaned and viewed from above, presented the appearance of an open
basin. The change in the whole internal form of the skull is sur-
prisingly great. The brain is modified in a corresponding manner,
as is shown in the two longitudinal sections, which deserve attentive
consideration. The upper and anterior cavity of the three into
which the skull may be divided, is the one which is so greatly
modified ; it is evidently much larger than in the Cochin skull of
the same size, and extends much further beyond the interorbital
septum, but laterally is less deep. This cavity, as I hear from Mr.
Tegetmeier, is entirely filled with brain. In the skull of the Cochin
and of all ordinary fowls a strong' internal ridge of bone separates
the anterior from the central cavity ; but this ridge is quite absent
in the Polish skull here figured. The shape of the central cavity is
circular in the Polish, and lengthened in the Cochin skull. The
shape of the posterior cavity, together with the position, size, and
number of the pores for the nerves, differ much in these two skulls.
A pit deeply penetrating the occipital bone of the Cochin is entirely
absent in this Polish skull, whilst in another specimen it was well
developed. In this second specimen the whole interna] surface of
the posterior cavity likewise differs to a certain extent in shape.
I made sections of two other skulls, — namely, of a Polish fowl with
the protuberance singularly little developed, and of a Sultan in
which it was a little more developed ; and when these two skulls
were placed between the two above figured (fig. 35), a perfect gra-
dation in the configuration of each part of the internal surface could
be traced. In the Polish skull, with a small protuberance, the ridge
between the anterior and middle cavities was present, but low ; and
in the Sultan this ridge was replaced by a narrow furrow standing
on a broad raised eminence.
It may naturally be asked whether these remarkable modifications
in the form of the brain affect the intellect of Polish fowls ; some
writers have stated that they are extremely stupid, but Pechstein
and Mr. Tegetmeier have shown that this is by no means generally
the case. Nevertheless Pechstein®® states that he had a Polish hen
which'' was crazy,- and anxiously wandered about all daylong.”
A hen in my possession was solitary in her habits, and was often so
absorbed in reverie that she could be touched ; she was also deficient
in the most singular manner in the faculty of finding her way, so
that, jf she strayed a hundred yards from her feeding-place, she
was completely lost, and would then obstinately try to proceed in a
wrong direction. I have received other and similar accounts of
Polish fowls appearing stupid or half-idiotic.^*-'
‘ Naturgeschichte Deutschlands,’ have received commuDications to a
Band iii. (1793), s. 400. similar effect from Messrs. Breut and
*0 Tho ‘Field,’ May 11th, 1861. J Tegetmeier.
Chap. VII.
OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFEEENCES.
277
To return to the skull of Polish fowls. The posterior part, viewed
externally, differs little from that of G. hankiva. In most fowls
the j)Osterior-lateral process of the frontal bone and the process of
the squamosal bone run together and are ossified near their ex-
tremities : this union of the two bones, however, is not constant in
any breed ; and in eleven out of fourteen skulls of crested breeds,
these processes were quite distinct. These processes, when not
united, instead of being inclined anteriorly, as in all common breeds,
descend at right angles to the lower jaw; and inthi^case the longer
** sections of Skull, of natural size, viewed laterally A Polish Cock
size ^ Cock, selected for comparison with the above from being of nearly the same
a^s of the bony cavity of the ear is likewise more perpendicular,
than in other breeds. When the squamosal process is free instead
of expanding at the tip, it is reduced to an extremely fine and
pointed style, of variable length. The pterygoid and quadrate bones
present no differences. The palatine bones are a little more curved
upwards at their posterior ends. The frontal bones, anteriorly to
the protuberance, are, as in Dorkings, very broad, but in a variable
degree. The nasal bones either stand far apart, as in Hamburghs,
or almost touch each other, and in one instance were ossified
together. Each nasal bone properly sends out in front two long
278
FOWLS.
Chap. Vir.
processfts of equal lengtlis, forming a fork; but in all the Polish
skulls, except one, the inner process was considerably, but in a
variable degree, shortened and somewhat upturned. In all the
skulls, except one, the two ascending branches of the premaxillary,
instead of running up between the processes of the nasal bones and
resting on the ethmoid bone, are much shortened and terminate in a
blunt, somewhat upturned point. In those skulls in which the
nasal bones approach quite close to each other or are ossified
together, it would be impossible for the ascending branches of the
premaxillary to reach the etlimoid and frontal bones ; hence we see
that even the relative connection of the bones has been changed.
Apparently in consequence of the bi-anches of the premaxillary and
of the inner processes of the nasal bones being somewhat upturned,
the external orifices of the nostrils are upraised and assume a
crescentic outline.
I must still say a few words on some of the foreign Crested
breeds. The skull of a crested, rumpless, white Turkish fowl was
very slightly protuberant, and but little perforated ; the ascending
branches of the premaxillary was well developed. In another
Turkish breed, called Ghoondooks, the skull was considerably protu-
berant and perforated ; the ascending branches of the premaxillary
were so much aborted that they projected only -j^th of an inch ; and
the inner processes of the nasal bone were so completely aborted, that
the surface where they should have projected was quite smooth.
Here then vee see these two bones modified to an extreme degree.
Of Sultans (another Turkish breed) I examined two skulls; in that
of the female the protuberance was much larger than in the male.
In both skulls the ascending branches of the premaxillary were very
short, and in both the nasal portion of the inner processes of the
nasal bones were ossified together. These Sultan skulls differed
from those of English Polish fowls in the frontal bones, anteriorly
to the protuberance, not being broad.
The last skull which I need describe is a unique one, lent to me
by Mr. Tegetmeier : it resembles a Polish skull in most of its
characters, but has not the great frontal protuberance; it has,
however, two rounded knobs of a different nature, which stand
more in front, above the lachrymal bones. These curious knobs,
into which the brain does not enter, are separated from each other
by a deep medial furrow ; and this is perforated by a few minute
pores. The nasal bones stand rather wide apart, with their inner
processes, and the ascending branches of the premaxillary, upturned
and shortened. The two knobs no doubt supjDorted the two great
horn -like projections of the comb.
From the foregoing facts we see in how astonishing a manner
some of the bones of the skull vary in Crested fowls. The pro-
tuberance may certainly be called in one sense a monstrosity, as
being wholly unlike anything observed in nature : but as in
ordinary cases it is not injurious to the bird, and as it is strictly
inherited, it can hardly in another sense be called a moiistrosity.
Chap. VII.
OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFERENCES.
279
A series may be formed commencing with the black boned Silk
fowl, which has a very small crest with the skull beneath penetrated
only’ by a few minute orifices, but with no other change in its
structure ; and from this first stage we may proceed to fowls with
a moderately large crest, which rests, according to Bechstein, on a
fleshy mass, but without any protuberance in the skull. I may add
that 1 have seen a similar fleshy or fibrous mass beneath the tuft
of feathers on the head of the Tufted duck ; and in this case there
was no actual protuberance in the skull, but it had become a little
more globular. Lastly, when we come to fowls with a largel}'
developed crest, the skull becomes largely protuberant and is per-
forated by a multitude of irregular open spaces. The close relation
between the crest and the size of the bony protuberance is shown in
another way; for Mr. Tegetaieier informs me that if chickens lately
hatched be selected with a large bony protuberance, when adult
Fig. 36. — Skull of Horned Fowl, of natural size, viewed from above, a little obliquely. (In
the possession of Tegetiueier.)
they will have a large crest. There can be no doubt that in former
times the breeder of Polish fowls attended solely to the crest, and
not to the skull ; nevertheless, by increasing the crest, in which he has
been wonderfully successful, he has unintentionally made the skull
protuberant to an astonishing degree ; and through correlation of
growth, he has at the same time affected the form and relative con-
nexion of the premaxillary and nasal bones, the shape of the orifice
of the nose, the breadth of the frontal bones, the shape of the post-
lateral processes of the frontal and squamosal bones, the direction
of the axis of the bony cavity of the ear, and lastly the internal
configuration of the whole skull together with the shape of the
brain.
VertehrcE. — In G. hanhiva there are fourteen cervical, seven dorsal
with ribs, apparently fifteen lumbar and sacral, and six caudal
280
FOWLS.
Chap. VII.
vertebrae;^’ but tlie lumbar and sacral are so much anchylosed that
I am not sure of their number, and this makes the comparison ol
the total number of vertebrae in the several breeds difficult. I have
spoken of six caudal vertebrae, because the basal one is almost
completely anchylosed with the pelvis; but if we consider the
number as seven, the caudal vertebrae agree in all the skeletons.
The cervical vertebrre are, as just stated, in appearance fourteen ;
but out of twenty-three skeletons in a fit state for examination, in
five of them, namely, in two Games, in two pencilled Hamburghs,
and in a Polish, the fourteenth vertebra bore ribs, which, though
small, were perfectly developed with a double articulation. The
presence of these little ribs cannot be considered as a fact of much
importance, for all the cervical vertebrae bear representatives of ribs;
but their development in the fourteenth vertebra reduces the size
of the passages in the transverse processes, and makes this vertebra
exactly like the first dorsal vertebra. The addition of these little ribs
does not affect the fourteenth cervical alone, for properly the ribs
of the first true dorsal vertebra are destitute of processes ; but
in some of the skeletons in which the fourteenth cervical bore
little ribs the first pair of true ribs had well-developed processes.
When we know that the sparrow has only nine, and the swan twenty-
three cervical vertebree,'^^ we need feel no surprise at the number
of the cervical vertebrae in the fowl being, as it appears, variable.
There are seven dorsal vertebrae bearing ribs ; the first dorsal is
never anchylosed with the succeeding four, which are generally
anchylosed together. In one Sultan fowl, however, the two first
dorsal vertebrae were free. In two skeletons, the fifth dorsal was
free ; generally the sixth is free (as in G. haiikiva), but sometimes
only at its posterior end, where in contact with the seventh. The
seventh dorsal vertebra, in every case excepting in one Spanish cock,
was anchylosed with the lumbar vertebrae. So that the degree to
which these middle dorsal vertebrae are anchylosed is variable.
Seven is the normal number of true ribs, but in two skeletons of
the Sultan fowl (in which the fourteenth cervical vertebra was not
furnished with little ribs) there were eight pairs ; the eighth pair
seemed to be developed on a vertebra corresponding with the first
lumbar in G. hankiva ; the sternal portion of both the seventh and
eighth ribs did not reach the sternum. In four skeletons in which
ribs were developed on the fourteenth cervical vertebra, there were,
when these cervical ribs are included, eight pairs ; but in one
Game cock, in which the fourteenth cervical was furnished with
ribs, there were only six pairs of true dorsal ribs ; the sixth pair in
this case did not have processes, and thus resembled the seventh
It appears that I have not
correctly designated the several groups
of vertebras, for a great authority,
Mr. W. K. Parker (‘ Transact. Zoolog.
Soc.,’ vch V. p. 198), specifies 16
cervical, 4 dorsal, 15 lumbar, and 6
caudal vertebrae in this genus. But
I have used the same terms in all the
following descriptions.
Macgillivray, ‘ British Birds,’ vol.
i. p. 25
Chai\ YIL
OSTEOLOGICAL DIFEEKENCES.
281
joair in other skeletons ; in this Game cock, as far as could be
judged from the apjDearance of the lumbar yertebrse, a whole dorsal
vertebra with its ribs was missing. We thus see that the ribs
(whether or not the little pair attached to the fourteenth cervical
vertebra be counted) vary from six to eight pair. The sixth pair is
frequently not furnished with processes. The sternal portion of
the seventh pair is extremely broad in Cochins, and is completely
ossified. As previously stated, it is scarcely possible to count the
lum bo-sacral vertebrm; but they certainly do not correspond in
shape or number in the several skeletons, 'jfiie caudal vertebrjB
are closely similar in all the skeletons, the only difference being
whether or not the basal one is anchylosed to the pelvis; they
hardly vary even in length, not being shorter in Cochins, with their
short tail-fea tilers, than in other breeds ; in a Spanish cock,
however, the caudal vertebrse were a little elongated. In three
rnmpless fowls the caudal vertebrae were few in number, and
anchylosed together into a misformed mass.
In the individual vertebrae the differences in structure are very
slight. In the atlas the cavity for the occipital condyle is either
ossified into a ring, or is, as in Bankiva,
open on its upper margin. The upper arc
of the spinal canal is a little more arched
in Cochins,' in conformity with the shape
of the occipital foramen, than in G. hankiva.
In several skeletons a difference, but not
of much importance, may be observed,
which commences at the fourth cervical
vertebra, and is gieatest at about the
sixth, seventh, or eighth vertebra; this
consists in the haemal descending processes
being united to the body of the vertebra
by a sort of buttress. This structure may
be observed in Cochins, Polish, some Ham-
bnrghs, and probably other breeds ; but
is absent, or barely developed, in Game, Dorking, Spanish, Bantam,
and several other breeds examined by me. On the dorsal surface
of the sixth cervical vertebra in Cochins three prominent points
are more strongly developed than in the corresponding vertebra,
of the Game fowl or G. hankiva.
Fig. 37 — Sixth Cervical Vertebra,
ofnatnral size, viewed laterally.
A. Wild Gallus bankiva. B.
Cochin Cock.
Ptlvis. — This differs in some few points in the several skeletons.
The anterior margin of the ilium seems at first to vary much in
outline, but this is chiefly due to the degree to which the margin
in the middle part is ossified to the crest of the vertebrae ; the outline,
however, does differ in being more truncated in Bantams, and more
rounded in certain breeds, as in Cochins. The outline of the
ischiadic foramen differs considerably, being nearly circular in
Bantams, instead of egg-shaped as in the Bankiva, and more
regularly oval in some skeletons, as in the Spanish. The obturator
notch is also much less elongated in some skeletons than in others.
282
FOWLS.
Chai’. VII.
The end of the pnhic bone presents the greatest difference ; being
hardly enlarged in the Bankiva; considerably and gradually
enlarged in Cochins, and in a lesser degree in some other breeds;
and abruptly enlarged in Bantams. In one Bantam this bone
extended xery little beyond the extremity of the ischium. The
whole pelvis in this latter bird differed widely in its proportions,
being far broader proportionally to its length than in Bankiva.
Sternum. — This bone is generally so much deformed that it is
scarcely possible to compare its shape strictly in the several breeds.
The form of the triangular ex-
tremity of the lateral processes
differs considerably, being either
almost equilateral or much elon-
gated. The front margin of the
crest is more or less perpendicular
and varies greatly, as does the
curvature of the posterior end,
and the flatness of the lower
surface. The outline of the
manubrial process also varies,
being wedge-shaped in the Ban-
kiva, and rounded in the Spanish
breed. The furculvm differs in
being more or less arched, and
greatly, as may be seen in the
accompanying outlines, in the
shape of the terminal plate ; but
the shape of this part differed a
little in two skeletons of the wild
Bmkiva. The coracoid presents
no difference worth notice. The
scapula varies in shape, being of
nearly uniform breadth in Ban-
kiva, much broader in the middle
in the Polish fowl, and abruptly
narrowed towards the apex in
the two Sultan fow Is.
I carefully compared each
separate bone of the leg and wing, relatively to the same bones
in the wild Bankiva, in the following breeds, which I thought were
the most likely to differ; namely, in Cochin, Dorking, Spanish,
Polish, Burmese Bantam, Frizzled Indian, and black-boned Silk
fowls; and it was truly surprising to see how absolutely every
process, articulation, and pore agreed, though the bones differed
greatly in size. The agreement is far more absolute than in other
parts of the skeleton. In stating this, I do not refer to the
relative thickness and length of the several bones ; for the tarsi
varied considerably in both these respects. But the other limb-
bones varied little even in relative length,
Fig. 3S.— Extremity of the Furcula, of
natural size, viewed laterally. A. Wild
(■'alius b'lnkiva. B. Spangled Polish
Fowl. C. Spanish Fowl. I). Dorking
Fowl. ^
V^Il.
OSTEOLOGICAL DIFFEKENCES.
283
Finally, I have not examined a sufficient number of skele-
tons to say whether any of the foregoing differences, except
in the skull, are characteristic of the several breeds. Appa-
rently some differences are more common in certain breeds
than in others, — as an additional rib to the fourteenth, cervical
vertebra i-n Hamburghs and Games, and the breadth of the
end of the j)nbic bone in Cochins. ' Both skeletons of the
Sultan fowl had eight dorsal vertebrm, and the end of the
scapula in both was somewhat attenuated. In tlie skull, the
deep medial furrow in the frontal bones and the vertically
elongated occipital foramen seem to be characteristic of
Cochins; as is the great breadth of the frontal bones in
Dorkings ; the separation and open spaces between the tips of
the ascending branches of the premaxillaries and nasal bones,
as well as the front part of the skull being but little depressed,
characterise Hamburghs ; the globular shape of the posterior
part of the skull seems to be characteristic of laced Bantams ;
and lastly, the protuberance of the skull with the ascending
branches of the premaxillaries partially aborted, together
with the other differences before specified, are eminently
characteristic of Polish and other Crested fowls.
But the most striking result of my examination of the
skeleton is the great variability of all the bones except those
of the extremities. To a certain extent we can understand
why the skeleton fluctuates so much in structure ; fowls have
been exposed to unnatural conditions of life, and their whole
organization has thus been rendered variable ; but the breeder
is quite indifferent to, and never intentionally selects, any
modification in the skeleton. External characters, if not
attended to by man, — such as the number of the tail and
wing feathers and their relative lengths, which in wild birds
are generally constant, — fluctuate in our domestic fowls in
the same manner as the seveiul parts of the skeleton. An
additional toe is a “ point ” in Dorkings, and has become a
fixed character, but is variable in Cochins and Silk fowls.
The colour of the plumage and the form of the comb are in
most breeds, or even sub-breeds, eminently fixed characters ;
but in Dorkings these points have not been attended to, and
are variable. AVhen any modification in the skeleton is
284
FOWLS.
Chai'. YII.
related to some external character which man values, it has
been, unintentionally on his part, acted on by selection, and
has become more or less fixed. We see this in the wonderful
protuberance of the skull, which supports the crest of feathers
in Polish fowls, and which by correlation has affected other
parts of the skull. VVe see the same result in the two pro-
tuberances which support the horns in the horned fowl, and
in the flattened shape of the front of the skull in Hamburgh s
consequent on their flattened and broad “ rose- combs.” We
know not in the least whether additional ribs, or the chan2:ed
outline of the occipital foramen, or the changed form of the
scapula, or of the extremity of the furculum, are in any way
correlated with other structures, or have arisen from the
changed conditions and habits of life to which our fowls have
been subjected ; but there is no reason to doubt that these
various modifications in the skeleton could be rendered, either
by direct selection, or by the selection of correlated structures,
as constant and as characteristic of each breed, as are the size
and shape of the body, the colour of the plumage, and the
form of the comb.
Effects o f the Disuse of Parts.
Judging from the habits of our European gallinaceous birds,
Gallus bankiva in its native haunts would use its legs and wings
more than do our domestic fowls, which rarely fly except to their
roosts. The Silk and the Frizzled fowls, from having iniperfect
wing- feathers, cannot fly at all ; and there is reason to believe that
both these breeds are ancient, so that their progenitors during
many generations cannot have flown. The Cochins, also, from their
short wings and heavy bodies, can hardly fly up to a low perch.
Therefore in these breeds, especially in the two first, a considerable
diminution in the wing-bones might have been expected, but this is
not the case. In every specimen, after disarticulating and cleaning
the bones, I carefully compared the relative length of the two main
bones of the wing to each other, and of the two main bones of the
leg to each other, with those of G. bankiva; and it was surprising
to see (except in the case of the tarsi) how exactly the same relative
length had been retained. This fact is curious, from showing how
truly the proportions of an organ may be inherited, although not
fully exercised during many generations. I then comjwred in
several breeds the length of the femur and tibia wdth the humerus
and ulna, and likewise these same bones with those of G. bankiva ;
the result was that the wing-bones in all the breeds (except the
CilAl*. V'll.
THE EFFECTS OF DISUSE.
285
Burmese Jumper, which has unnaturally short legs, are slightly
shortened relatively to the leg-bones ; but the decrease is so slight
that it may be due to the standard specimen of O. hankiva having
accidentally had wings of slightly greater length than usual; so
that the measurements are not worth giving. But it deserves
notice that the Silk and Frizzled fowls, which are quite incapable
of flight, had their wings less reduced relatively to their legs than
in almost any other breed ! We have seen with domesticated
pigeons that the bones of the wings are somewhat reduced in length,
whilst the primary feathers are rather increased in length, and it is
just possible, though not probable, that in the Silk and Frizzled
fowls any tendency to decrease in the length of the wing-bones from
disuse may have been checked through the law of compensation, by
the decreased growth of the wing-feathers, and consequent increased
supply of nutriment. The wing-bones, however, in both these breeds,
are found to be slightly reduced in length when judged by the
standard of the length of the sternum or head, relatively to these
same parts in G. hankiva.
The actual weight of the main bones of the leg and wing in twelve
breeds is given in the two first columns in the following table. The
calculated weight of the wing-bones relatively to the leg-bones, in
comparison with the leg and wing-bones of O. hankiva, are given
in the third column, — the weight of the wing-bones in G. hankiva
being called a hundred.'^
Table T.
Names of Breeds.
Actual
; AVeight
of
Femur
1 and
Tibia,
Actual
Weight of
Humerus
and Ulna.
Weight of Wlng-
bunes relatively to
the Leg-bones in
comparison with
these same bones
in G. bankiva
Gallus hankiva ..
wild male
Grains.
86
Grains.
54
100
1
Cochin
male
311
162
83
2
Dorking
male
557
248
70
3
Spanish (Minorca) . .
male
386
183
75
4
Gold-Spanglf d Polish
male
306
145
75
5
Game, black- breasted
male
293
143
77
6
Malay
female
231
116
80
7
Sultan
male
189
94
79
8
Indian Frizzh d . .
male
206
88
67
9
! Burmese Jumper
female
53
36
108
10
Hamburgh (pencilled) male
157
101
106
11
' Hamburgh (pencilled) female
114
77
108
12
Sdk (black-boned) . .
female
88
57
103
It may be well to explain how leg -^ones are to the wing-bones aa
tho calculation has been made for the 86 : 54, or as (neglecting decimals)
third column. In G. hankiva the 100 ; 62; — in Cochins as 311 : 162, oj
280
FOWLS.
Chap. VI 1.
In the eight first birds, belonging to distinct breeds, in this table,
we see a decided reduction in the weight of the bones of the wing.
In the Indian Frizzled fowl, which cannot fly, the reduction is
carried to the greatest extent, namely, to thirty-three per cent, of
their proper proportional weight. In the next four birds, including
the Silk hen, which is incapable of flight, we see that the wings,
relatively to the legs, are slightly increased in weight; but it should
be observed that, if in these birds the legs had become from any
cause reduced in weight, this would give the false appearance of
tlie wings having increased in relative weight. Now a reduction of
this nature has certainly occurred with the Burmese Jumper, in
which the legs are abnormally short, and in the two Hamburghs
and Silk fowl, the legs, though not short, are formed of remarkably
thin and light bones. I make these statements, not judging by
mere eyesight, but after having calculated the weights of the leg-
bones relatively to those of O. hankiva, according to the only two
standards of comparison which I could use, namely, the relative
lengths of the head and sternum ; for I do not know the weight of
the body in O. bankiva, which would have been a better standard.
According to these standards, the leg-bones in these four fowls are
in a marked manner far lighter than in any other breed. It may
therefore be concluded that in all cases in which the legs have not
been through some unknown cause much reduced in weight, the
wing-bones have become reduced in weight relatively to the leg-
bones, in comparison with those of (Jt. bankiva. And this reduction
of weight may, I apprehend, safely be attributed to disuse.
To make the foregoing table quite satisfactory, it ought to have
been shown that in the eight first birds the leg-bones have not actually
increased in weight out of due proportion with the rest of the body ;
this I cannot show, from not knowing, as already remarked, the
weight of the wild Bankiva.’^ I am ind^eed inclined to suspect that
the leg-bones in the Dorking, No. 2 in the table, are proportionally
too heavy ; but this bird was a very large one, weighing 7 lb. 2 oz.,
though very thin. Its leg-bones were more than ten times as heavy
as those of the Burmese Jumper! I tried to ascertain the length
both of the leg-bones and wing-bones relatively to other parts of
the body and skeleton : but the whole organisation in these birds,
which have been so long domesticated, has become so variable, that
«s 100 : 52 ; — in Dorkings as 557 : 248,
or as 100 : 44 ; and so on for the
ether breeds. We thus get the series
62, 52, 44 for the relative weights
of the wing-bones in 6r. hankka^
Cochins, Dorkings, &c. And now
taking 10 \ instead of 62, tor the
weight of the wing-bones in G. bankiva,
we get, by another rule of three, 84
as the weign. of the wing-bones in
Cochins; 70 in the Dorkings; and
so on for the remainder of the third
column in the table.
Mr. Blyth (in ‘Annals and Mag.
of Nat. Hist.,’ 2nd series, vol. I„ 1 848,
p. 456) gives 3^ lb. as the weignt of
a full-grown male G, bankiva; but
from what I have seen of the skins
and skeletons of various breeds, I
cannot believe that ray two specimens
of G. bankiva could have weighed so
much.
Chap. VII.
THE EFFECTS OF DISUSE.
28Y
no certain conclusions could be reached. For instance, the legs of
the above Dorking cock were nearly three-quarters of an inch too
short relatively to the length of the sternum, and more than three-
quarters of an inch too long relatively to the length of the skull,
in comparison with these same parts in G. hankiva.
In the following Table II. in the two first columns we see in
inches and decimals the length of the sternum, and the extreme
depth of its crest to which the pectoral muscles are attached. In
the third column we have the calculated depth of the crest, relatively
to the length of the sternum, in comparison with these same pnrts
in G. hankiva!''^
Table II.
Names of breeds.
Length
of
Sternum.
Depth of
Crest
of
Sternum.
Depth of Crest
relatively to the
length of the
Sternum, in
comparison with
G. banMva.
Inches.
Inches.
Gallus hankiva
male
4-20
1-40
100
1
Cochin
male
5-83
1-55
78
2
Dorking . .
. . mala
8-9.5
1-97
84
3
Spanish
. . male
61i>
1-83
90
4
Polish
. . male
5-07
1-.50
87
5
Game
.. male
.5-55
1-55
81
6
Malay
, . female
5 10
1-50
87
7
Sultan
. . male
4-47
1-36
90
8
Frizzled hen
4-25
1-20
84
9
Burmese Jumper . .
. , female
3-06
0-85
81
10
Hamburgh
. . male
5 08
1-40
81
11
Hamburgh
4 55
1 26
81
12
Silk fowl
, . female
4-49
1-01
68
By looking to the third column we see that in every case the
depth of the crest relatively to the length of the sternum, in com-
parison with G. hankiva, is diminished, generally between 10 and
20 per cent. But the degree of reduction varies much, partly in
consequence of the frequently deformed state of the sternum. In
the Silk fowl, which cannot %, the crest is 34 per cent, less deep
than what it ought to have been. This reduction of the crest in all
the breeds probably accounts for the great variability, before
referred to, in the curvature of the furculum, and in the shape of its
sternal extremity. Medical men believe that the abnormal form of
the spine so commonly observed in women of the higher ranks
results from the attached muscles not being fully exercised. So
it is with our domestic fowls, for’ they use their pectoral muscles
The third column is calculated on the same principle as explained in the
previous foot-note, p. 285.
288
FOWLS.
Chap. Vll
but little, and, ont of twenty-five sternum s examined by me, three
alone were perfectly symmetrical, ten were moderately crooked, and
twelve were deformed to an extreme degree. Mr. Romanes, however,
believes that the malformation is due to fowls whilst young resting
their sternums on the sticks on which they roost.
Finally, we ma}’’ conclude with respect to the various breeds
of the fowl, that the main bones of the wing have probably
been shortened in a very slight degree ; that they have certainly
become lighter relatively to the leg-bones in all the breeds in
which these latter bones are not unnaturally short or deli-
cate ; and that the crest of the sternum, to which the pectoral
muscles are attached, has invariably become less prominent,
the whole sternum being also extremely liable to deformity*.
These results we may attribute to the lessened use of the
wings.
Correlation of Growth. — I will here sum up the few facts
which I have collected on this obscure, but important, subject.
In Cochin and Game fowls there is perhaps some relation
between the colour of the plumage and the darkness of the
egg-shell. In Sultans the additional sickle-feathers in the
tail are apparently related to the general redundancy of the
plumage, as shown by the feathered legs, large crest, and
beard. In two tailless fowls which I examined the oil-gland
was aborted. A large crest of feathers, as Mr. Tegetmeier
has remarked, seems alway^s accompanied by a great dimi-
nution or almost entire absence of the comb. A large beard,
is similarly accompanied by diminished or absent wattles.
These latter cases apparently come under the law of com-
pensation or balan cement of growth. A large beard beneath
the low*er jaw and a large top-knot on the skull often gc
together. Tho c;omb when of any peculiar shape, as with
Horned, Spanish, and Hamburgh fowls, affects in a corre
spending manner the underlying skull ; and we have seen
liow wonderfully^ this is the case with Crested fowls when
the crest is largely developed. With the protuberance of the
frontal bones the shape of the internal sur'ace of the skull
and of the brain is greatly modified. The presence of a crest
influences in some unknown way the development of the
ascending branches of the premaxillary bone, and of the
Chap. VII.
CORRELATION OF GROWTH.
289
inner processes of the nasal hones ; and likewise the shape of
tlie external orifice of the nostrils. There is a plain and
curious correlation between a crest of feathers and the im
perfectly ossified condition of the skull. Not only does this
hold good with nearly all crested fowls, but likewise with
tufted ducks, and as Dr. Gunther informs me with tufted
geese in Germany.
Lastly, the feathers composing the crest in ~hiale Polish
fowls resemble hackles, and differ greatly in shape from those
in the crest of the female. The neck, wing-coverts, and loins
in the male bird are properly covered with hackles, and it
would appear that feathers of this shape have spread by
correlation to the head of the male. 'J'his little fact is in-
teresting ; l)ecause, though both sexes of some wild gallina-
ceous birds have their heads similarly ornamented, yet there
is often a difference in the size and shape of feathers forming
their crests. Furthermore, there is in some cases, as in the
male Gold and in the male Amherst pheasants (P. pirtiis and
amJiersfice), a close relation in colour, as well as in structure,
between the plumes on the head and on the loins. It would
therefore appear that the same law has regulated the state of
the feathers on the head and body, both with species liAung
under natural conditions, and with birds which have varied
under domestication.
20
290
DOMESTIC DUCKS.
Chap. VIll
CHAPTER VIII.
DUCK— (lOOSE— PEACOCK — TURKEY GUINEA-FOWD— CANARY-
BiRD — GOLD-FISH — HI VK-BEES— SILK-MOTIIS.
DU(U\S, SEVERAL BREEDS OP— PROGRESS OP DOMESTICATION — ORIGIN OF
PROJI THE COMMON AVILD-DrCFi — DIPPERENCES IN THE DIPPJ'RIENT BREEDS
— OSTEOLOlHCAL DIPPERENCES — EPPECTS OP USE AND DISUSE ON THE
LIJIB-BONES.
GOOSE, ANCIENTLY DOMESTICATED — LITTLE VARIATION OF — SEBASTOPOL
BREED.
PEACOCK, ORIGIN OF BLACK-SHOULDERED BREED.
'J'UKKEY, BREEDS OF — CROSSED WITH THE UNITED STATES SPECIES —
EPPECTS OP CLIMATE ON.
GUINEA-EOWL, CANAEY-BIRD, GOLD-FISH, HIVE-BEES.
SlEK-MO'l’HS, SPECIES and breeds op — anciently domesticated —
CARE IN THEIR SELECTION — DIFFERENCES IN THE DIFFERENT RACES — IN
THE EGG, CATERPILLAR AND COCOON STATES — INHERITANCE OF CHA-
- RACTERS— IMPERFECT WINGS — LOST INSTINCTS — CORRELATED CHARACTERS.
I WILL, as in previous cases, first briefly describe the chief
domestic breeds of the duck : —
Breed 1. Cummon Domestic Duck. — Varies much in colour and
in proportions, and differs in instincts and disposition from the
wild duck. There are several sub-breeds : — (1) The Aylesbury, of
great size, white, with pale-yellow beak and legs ; abdominal dermal
sack largely developed. (2) The Rouen, of great size, coloured like
the wild duck, with green or mottled beak; dermal sack largely
developed, (d) Tufted Duck, with a large top-knot of fine downy
feathers, supported on a fleshy mass, with the skull perforated
beneath. The top-knot in a duck which I imported from Holland
was two and a half inches in diameter. (4) Labrador (or Canadian,
or Buenos Ayres, or East Indian) ; plumage entirely black ; beak
broader, relatively to its length, than in the wild duck ; eggs slightly
tinted with black. This sub-breed perhaps ought to be ranked as
a breed; it includes two sub- varieties, one as large as the common
domestic duck, wdiich I have kept alive, and the other smaller and
often capable of flight.^ I presume it is this latter sub-variety
wdiich has been described in Fran e ^ as flying well, being rather
wild, and when cooked having the flavour of the wild duck ; never-
• ‘Poultry Chronicle ’ (1854), vol. ^ Dr Turral, in ‘ Bull. Soc. d’Ac-
u. p. 91, and vol. i. p. 3oO climat.,’ torn. vii. 1860, p. 541.
OiiAP. vni
EXTEENAL DIFFERENCES.
291
Hieless this sub-variety is polygamous, like other domesticated
ducks and unlike the wild duck. These black Ijabrador ducks
breed true ; but a case is given by Dr. Turral of the French sub-
variety produciDg young with some white feathers on the head and
neck, and with an ochre-coloured patch on the breast.
Breed 2. Evohhilled Buck. — This bird presents a^! extraordinn ry
appearance from the downward curvature of the beak. The head is
often tufted. The common colour is white, but some are coloured
like wild ducks. It is an ancient breed, having been noticed in
.1676.® It shows its prolonged domestication by almost incessantly
laying eggs, like the fowls which are called everlasting layers.^
Breed 3. Call Duck. — Remarkable from its small size, and from
the extraordinary loquacity of the female. Beak short. These
birds are either white, or coloured like the wild duck.
Breed 4. Feuguin Duck. — This is the most remarkable of all the
breeds,sand seems to have originated in the Malayan archipelago.
It walks with its body extremely erect, and with its thin neck
stretched straight upwards. Beak rather short. Tail upturned,
including only 18 feathers. Femur and metatarsus elongated.
Almost all naturalists admit that the several breeds are
descended from the common wild duck {Anas hoschas') ; most
fanciers, on the other hand, take as usual a veiy different
view.^ Unless we deny that domestication, prolonged during
centuries,^ can affect even such unimportant characters as
colour, size, and in a slight degree proportional dimensions
and mental disposition, there is no reason whatever to doubt
that the domestic duck is descended from ihe common wild
species, for the one differs from the other in no important
character. We have some historical evidence with respect to
the period and progress of the domestication of the duck. It
Avas unknown® to the ancient Egyptians, to the Jew^s of the
Old Testament, and to the Greeks of the Homeric period.
About eighteen centuries ago Columella and Varro speak of
’ Willughby’s ‘Ornithology,’ by
Raj, p. 381. This breed is also
figured by Albin, in 1734, in his
‘ Nat. Hist, of Birds,’ vol. ii. p. 86.
* F. Cuvier, in ‘Annales du Museum,’
tom, ix. p. 128, says that moulting
and incubation alone stops these ducks
laying. Mr. B. P. Brent makes a
similar remark in the ‘Poultry Chro-
nicle,’ 1855, vcl. iii. p. 512.
® Rev. E. S. Dixon, ‘Ornamental
and Domestic Poultry’ (1848), p.
117. Mr. B. P. Brent, in ‘Poultry
Chronicle,’ vol. iii., 1855, p. 512.
® Crawfurd on the ‘ Relation of
Domesticated Animals to Civilisation,’
read before the Brit. Assoc, at Oxford,
1860.
^ Bureau de la Malle, in ‘Annales
des Sciences Nat.,’ tom. xvii. p. 164;
2,12
DOMESTIC DUCKS.
Chap. VIIT.
the necessity of keeping ducks in netted enclosures like other
wild fowl, so that at this period there was danger of their
Hying away. Moreover, the plan recoinincnded by Columella
to those who wish to increase their stock of ducks, namely
to collect the eggs, of the wild bird and to place them under
a hen, shows, as Mr. Dixon remarks, “ that the duck had
not at this time become a naturalized and prolific inmate of
the Roman poultry-yard.” The oiigin of the domestic duck
from the wild species is recognised in nearly every language
of Europe, as Aldrovandi long ago remarked, by the same
name being applied to both. The wild duck has a wide
range from the Himalayas to North America. It crosses
]-eadily with the domestic bird, and the crossed offspring are
perfectly fertile.
Both in North America and Europe the wild duck has been
found easy to tame and breed. In Sweden Ihis experiiment
was carefully tried by Tiburtius ; he succeeded in rearing
wild ducks for three generations, but, though they were
treated like common ducks, they did not vary even in a
single feather. The young birds suffered from being allowed
to swim about in cold water, ^ as is known to be the case,
though the fact is a strange one, with the young of the
common domestic duck. An accurate and well-known ob-
server in England^ has described in detail his often repeated
and successful experiments in domesticating the wild duck.
Young birds are easily reared from eggs hatched under a
bantam; but to succeed it is indispensable not to place the
eggs of both the wild and tame duck under the same hen,
for in this case “the young wild ducks die off, leaving their
more hardy brethren in undisturbed possession of their foster-
mother’s care. The difference of habit at the onset in the
!Uid tom. XXI. p. 5.5. Rev. E. S.
DixoQ, ‘Ornamental Poultry,’ p. 118.
Tame ducks were not known in Aris-
totle’s time, as remarked by Volz, in
his ‘ Beitrage zur Kulturgeschichte,’
1852, s. 78.
® I quote this account from ‘ Die
Enten- und Schwanenzucht,’ Ulm,
1828, s. 143. Audubon’s ‘ Ornitho-
logical Biography,’ vol. iii. p. 168, on
the taming of ducks on the Mississippi.
For the same fact in England, see Mr.
Waterton in Loudon’s Mag. of Nat.
Hist.,’ vol. viii. 1835, p. 542 ; and
Mr. St. John, ‘Wild Sports and Nat.
Hist, of the Highlands,’ 1846, p. 129.
® Mr. E. Hewitt, in ‘Journal ot
Horticulture,’ 1862, p. 773; and
1863, p. 39.
Chap. VIII.
EXTERNAL DIFFERENCES.
293
newly-hatclied ducklings almost entails such a result to a
certainty.” The wild ducklings were from the first quite
tame towards those who took care of them as long as they
wore the same clothes, and likewise to the dogs and cats of
the house. They would even snap with their beaks at the
dogs, and drive them away from any spot which they coveted.
Hut they were much alarmed at strange men and dogs.
Differently fi om what occurred in Sweden, Mr. 'Hewitt found
that his young birds always changed and deteriorated in
character in the course of two or three generations ; not-
withstanding that great care was taken to prevent their
crossing with tame ducks. After the third generation his
birds lost the elegant carriage of the wild species, and began
to acquire the gait of the common duck. They increased in
size in each generation, and their legs became less fine. The
white collar round the neck of the mallard became broader
and less regular, and some of the longer primary wing-feathers
became more or less white. When this occurred, Mr. Hewitt
destroyed nearly the whole of his stock and procured fresh
eggs from wild nests ; so that he never bred the same family
for more than five or six generations. His birds continued
to pair together, and never became polygamous like the
common domestic duck. I have given these details, because
no other case, as far as I know, has been so carefully re-
corded by a competent observer of the progress of change
in wild birds reared for several generations in a domestic
Condition.
From these considerations there can hardly be a doubt that
the wild duck is the parent of the common domestic kind ;
nor need we look to other species for the parentage of the
'more distinct breeds, namely. Penguin, Call, Hook-billed,
Tufted, and Labrador ducks. I will not repeat the arguments
used ii\ the previous chapters on the improbability of man
having in ancient times domesticated several species since
become unknown or extinct, though ducks are not readily
exterminated, in the wild state; — on some of the supposed
parent-species having had abnormal characters in comparison
with all the other species of the genus, as with Hook-billed
and Penguin ducks ; — on all the breeds, as far as is known
294
DOMESTIC DUCKS.
CUA1>, V III.
being fertile together;^® — on all the breeds having the same
general disposition, instinct, Szg. But one fact bearing on
this (][uestion may be noticed: in the great duck family, one
species alone, namely, the male of A. boschas, has its four
middle tail-feathers curled upwardly ; now in every one
of the above-named domestic breeds tlicse curled feathers
exist, and on the supposition that they are descended fi’om
distinct species, we must assume that man formerly liit
upon species all of which had this now unique character.
Moi cover, subvarieties of each breed are coloured almost
exactly like the wild duck, as I have seen with the
largest and smallest breeds, namely Rouens and Call ducks,
and, as Mr. Brent states,^^ is the case with Hook billed
ducks. This gentleman, as he informs me, crossed a white
Aylesbury drake and a black Labrador duck, and some of
the ducklings as they grew up assumed the plumage of the
wild duck.
With respect to Penguins, I have not seen many specimens,
and none were coloured precisely like the wild duck ; but Sir
dames Brooke sent me three skins from Lombok and Bali, in
the Malaj^an archipelago; the two fenrdes were paler and
more rufous than the wild duck, and the drake dPlered in
having the whole under and upper surface (excepting the
neck, tail-coverts, tail, and wings) silver-grey, finely pencilled
with dark lines, closely like certain parts of the plumage of
the wild mallard. But I found this drake to be identical in
every feather with a variety of the common breed procured
from a farm-yard in Kent, and I have occasionally elsewhere
seen similar specimens. The occurrence of a duck bred under
so^joeculiar a climate as that of the Malayan archipelago,
where the wild species does not exist, with exactly the same
1 have met with several state-
ments on the fertility of the several
breeds when crossed. Mr. Yarrell
assured me that' Call and common
ducks are perfectly fertile together.
I crossed Hook-billed and common
ducks, and a Penguin and Labrador,
and the crossed Ducks were quite
fertile, though they were not bred
inter se, so that the experiment was
not fully tried. Some half-brea
Penguins and Labradors were agaiii
crossed with Penguins, and subse-
(juently bred by me inter se, and they
were extremely fertile.
" ‘ Poultry Chronicle,’ 1855, vol
iii. p. 512.
Chap. VUL
EXTEENAL DIFFEKENCES.
295
plumage as may occasionally be seen in our farm-yards, is a
fact worth notice. Nevertheless the climate of the Malayan
archipelago apparently tends to cause the duck to vary much,
for Zollinger,^- speaking of the Penguin breed, says that in
'Lombok “ there is an unusual and very wonderful variety of
ducks.” One Ptmguin drake which I kept alive differed from
those of which the skins were sent me from Lombok, in
havirg its breast and back partially coloured Avith chestnul-
brown, thus more closely resembling the Mallard.
From these several facts, more especially from the drakes
of all the breeds having curled tail-feathers, and from certain
sub-varieties in each breed occasionally resembling in general
plumage the wild duck, we may conclude with confidence
that all the breeds are descended from A. hoschas.
I will now notice some of the peculiarities characteristic of the
several breeds. The eggs vary in colour ; some common ducks
laying pale-greenish and others quite white eggs. The eggs which
are first laid during each season by the black Labrador duck, are
tinted black, as if rubbed with ink. A good observer assured me
that one year his ducks of this breed laid almost perfectly white
eggs. Another curious case shows what singular variations some-
times occur and are inherited ; Mr. Hansell relates that he had
a common duck which always laid eggs with the yolk of a dark-
brown colour like melted glue ; and the young ducks, hatched from
these eggs, laid the same kind of eggs, so that the breed had to be
destroyed.
The Hook-billed duck is highly remarkable (see fig. of skull,
woodcut No. 39); and its peculiar beak has been inherited at
legist since the year 1676. This structure is evidently analogous
with that described in the Bagadotten carrier pigeon. Mr. Brent
says that, when Hook-billed ducks are crossed with common ducks,
“ many young ones are produced with the upper mandible shorter
than the lower, which not unfrequently causes the death of the
bird.” With ducks a tuft of feathers on the head is by no means a
rare occurrence ; namely, in the True-tulted breed, the Hook-billed,
the common farm-yard kind, and in a duck having no other pecu-
liarity which was sent to me from the Malayan archipelago. The
tuft is only so I'ar interesting as it affects the skull, which is thus
rendered slightly more globular, and is perforated by numerous
apertures. Call ducks are remarkable from their extraordinary
‘Journal of f'le Indian Archi- (1849-1850), p. 2353.
pelago,’ vol. V. p. 334. ‘ Poultry Chronicle,’ 1855, vol,
** ‘The Zoologist,’ vols. vii., viii. iii. p. 512.
DOMESTIC DUCKS.
Chap. Vlll
29()
lo(iuacity: the drake only hisses like common drakes; nevertheless
wlien paired with the common duck, ho transmits to his female
offspring a strong quacking tendency. This loquacity seems at
lirst a surprising character to have been acquired under domesti-
cation. But the voice varies in the different breeds; Mr. Brent
says that Hook-billed ducks arc very loquacious, and that Eouens
utter a “dull, loud, and monotonous cry, easily distinguishable by
an experienced ear.” As the loquacity of the Call duck is highly
serviceable, these birds being used in decoys, this quality may have
been increased by selection. For instance. Colonel Hawker says, if
young wild ducks cannot bo got for a decoy, “ by way of make-shift,
aelect tame birds which are the most clamorous, even if their colour
should not be like that of wild ones.” It has been erroneously
asserted that Call ducks hatch their eggs in less time than common
ducks I'
The Penguin duck is the most remarkable of all the breeds ; the
thin neck and body are carried erect ; the wings are small ; the tail
is upturned; and the thigh-bones and ■ metatarsi are considerably
lengthened in proportion with the same bones in the wild duck.
In five specimens examined by me there were only eighteen tail-
feathers instead of twenty as in the wild duck; but I have also
found only eighteen and nineteen tail-feathers in two Labrador
ducks. On the middle toe, in three specimens, there were twenty-
seven or twenty-eight scutelise, whereas in two wild ducks there were
thirty-one and thirty-two. The Penguin when crossed transmits
with much power its peculiar form of body and gait to its offspring ;
tliis was manifest with some hybrids raised in the Zoological
Gardens between one of these birds and the Egyptian goose
{Anser cegyptiacus) , and likewise with some mongrels which I
raised between the Penguin and Labrador duck. 1 am not much
surprised that some writers should maintain that this breed must
be descended from an unknown and distinct species ; but from the
reasons already assigned, it seems to me far more probable that it
is the descendant, much modified by domestication under an
unnatural climate, of Anas hoschis.^
Osttological Characters — The skulls of the several breeds differ
from each other and from the skull of the wild duck in very little
except in the proportional length and curvature of the premaxil-
laries. These- latter bones in the Cali duck are short, and a line
drawn from their extremities to the summit of the skull is nearly
straight, instead of being concave as in the common duck ; so that
^ Poultry Chronicle,’ vol. iii.
1855, p. 312. With respect to Houeus,
see ditto, vol. i., 1854, p. 167.
'® Col. Hawker’s ‘ Instructions to
''oung Sportsmen,’ quoted by Mr.
Dixon in his ‘ Ornamental Poultry,’
p. 125.
‘Cottage Gardener,’ April 9th,
1861.
These hybrids have been described
by M. Selys-Longchamps in the
‘Bulletins (tom. xii. No 10) Acad.
Roy. de Bruxelles.’
Chap. VIII. DIFFERENCES IN THEIR SKELETONS. 297
the skull resembles that of a small goose. In the Hook-billed duck
(tig. by), these same bones as well as the lower jaw curve down-
wards in a most reniarkabJe manner, as represented. In the
Labrador duck the premaxillaries are rather broader than in the
wild duck; and in two skulls of this breed the vertical ridges on
each side of the supra-occipital bone are very prominent. In the
Penguin the premaxillaries are relatively shorter than in the wild
duck; and the inferior points of the paramastoids more prominent.
In a Dutch tufted duck, the skull .under the enormous tuft was
slightly more globular and was perforated by two large apertures ;
ill this skull the lachrymal bones were produced much further
backwards, so as to have a ditferent shape and nearly to touch the
post. lat. processes of the frontal bones, thus almost completing the
bony orbit of the eye. As the quadrate and pterygoid bones are of
Fig 39.— Skulls, viewed laterally, reduced to two-thirds of the natural size. A. V/ild Duck.
B. Hook-billed Duck.
such complex shape and stand in relation with so many other
bones, I carefully compared them in all the principal breeds ; but
excepting in size they presented no difference.
Vertebree and llihs. — ^In one skeleton of the Labrador duck there
were the usual fifteen cervical vertebrae and the usual nine dorsal
vertebrae bearing ribs ; in the other skeleton there were ' fifteen
cervical and ten dorsal vetebrae with ribs ; nor, as far as could be
judged, was this owing merely to a rib having been developed on
the first lumbar vertebra; for in both skeletons the lumbar
vertebrae agreed perfectly in number, shape, and size with those of
the wild duck. In two skeletons of the Call duck there weie
298
DOxMESTIC DUCKS.
Chap VIII.
fifteen cervical and nine dorsal vertebrae ; in a third skeleton small
ribs were attaclied to the so-called fifteenth cervical vertebra,
making ten ijairs of ribs ; but these ten ribs do not correspond, or
arise from the same vertebra, with the ten in the above-mentioned
Labrador duck. In the Call duck, which had small ribs attached
to the fifteenth cervical vertebra, the haemal spines of the thirteenth
and fourteenth (cervical) and of the seventeenth (dorsal) vertebrae
corresponded with the spines on the fourteenth, fifteenth, and
eighteenth vertebrae of the wild duck : so that each of these
vertebrae had acquired a structure proper to one posterior to it in
position. In the eighth cervical
vertebra of this same Call duck
(fig. 40, B ), the two branches of the
haemal spine stand much closer
together than in the wild duck
(A), and the descending haemal
processes are much shortened.
In the Penguin duck the neck
from its thinness and erectness
falsely appears (as ascertained by
measurement) to be much elon-
gated, but the cc rvical and dorsal
vertebrae present no difference;
the posterior dorsal vertebrae,
however, are more completely
anchylosed to the pelvis lhan in
the wild duck. The Aylesbury
duck has fifteen cervical and ten
dorsal vertebrae furnished with
ribs, but the same number of
luinbar, sacral, and caudal verte-
brae, as far as could be traced, as
ill the wild duck. The cervical
vertebrae in this same duck (fig.
40, D) were much broader and thicker relatively to their length than
in the wild (C) ; so much so, that I have thought it tvorth while to
give a sketch of the twelfth cervical vertebra in these two birds.
From the foregoing statements we see that the fifteenth cervical
vertebra occasionally becomes modified into a dorsal vertebra, an I
when this occurs all the adjoining vertebrae are modified. We abo
see that an additional dorsal vertebra bearing a rib is occasion iliy
developed, the number of the cervical and lumbar vertebnc
apparently remaining the same as usual.
I examined the bony enlargement of the trachea in the ma’es of
the Penguin, Call, Hook-billed, Labrador, and Aylesbury breeds ;
and in all it was identical in shape.
The is remarkably uniform ; but in the skeleton of the
Hook-billed duck the anterior ]3nrt is much bowed inwards ; in the
Aylesbury and some other breeds the ischiadic foramen is less
Fig. 4^. — Cervical Vertebrae, of natural size.
A. Eighth cei vical vertebra of Wild Duck,
viewed on haemal sur'ace. B. Eighth
cervical vertebra of Call Duck, viewed as
above C. Twelfth cervical vertebra of
Wild Duck viewed lateral! V. D. Twelfth
corvic.d vertebra of Aylesbury Duck,
viewed laterally.
Chap. VIII
EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE.
29D
elongated. In the sternum, furcnlnm, coracoids, and scapulm, the
differences are so slight and so variable as not to be worth notice,
except that in two skeletons of the Penguin duck the terminal
portion of the scapula was much attenuated.
In the bones of the leg and wing no modification in shape could
bo observed. But in the Penguin and Hook-billed ducks, the
terminal phalanges of the wing are a little shortened. In the
former, the femur, and metatarsus (but not the tibia) are con-
siderably lengthened, relatively to the same bones in the wild duck,
and to the wing-bones in both birds. This elongation of tho leg-
bones could be seen whilst the bird was alive, and is no doubt
connected with its peculiar upright manner of walking. In a
large Aylesbury duck, on the other hand, the tibia was the only
bone of the leg which relatively to the other bones was slightly
lengthened.
On thf'- effects of the increased and decreased Use of the Limbs. — In
all the breeds the bones of the wing (measured separately after
having been cleaned) relatively to those ol the leg have become
slightly shortened, in comparison with the same bones in the wild
duck, as may be seen in the following table ^
Name of Breed.
Length of Femur,
Tibia, and Meta-
tarsus together.
Length of Humerus,
Radius, and Meta-
carpus together.
Or as
Inches.
Inches.
Wild mallard
7-14
9-28
100 : 129
Aylesbury .. .. ..
8-64
10-43
100 : 120
Tufted (Dulcli)
8-25
9-83
100 : 119
Penguin
7-12
8-78
Moo : 123
Call
6-20
7-77
100 : 125
Length of same
Length of all the
Bones.
Bones of Wing.
Inches.
Inches.
i
Wild duck (another speci-
1
men)
.6-85
10-07
1 100 ; 147
Common domestic duck . .
8*15
11-26
100 ; 138
In the foregoing table we see, by comparison with the wild duck,
that the reduction in the length of the bones of the wing, re-”
lativefy to those of the legs, though slight, is universal. The
reduction is least in the Call duck, which has the power and the
habit of frequently flying.
In weight there is a greater relative difference between the bones
of the leg and wing, as may be seen in the following table ; —
300
DOMESTIC DUCKS.
Chap. \11L
Name of Breed.
Wclglit of Femur,
Tibia, and
Metatarsus.
Weight of
Humerus, Radius,
and Metacarpus.
Or as
Grains.
Graii.s.
Wild inallai'd
54
97
100 : 179
Aylesbury
164
204
10!) ; 124
llookeil-bill
107
160
100 : 149
Tufted (Dutch)
111
148
100 : 134
Dengiiiii
1 75
90-5
100 : 120
Labiador
i
165
100 : 117
Call
1
94
100 : 163
Weight of all the 1
I Weight of all the
Bones of the
Bones of the
Log and Foot.
1 Wing.
Grains.
Grains.
Wild (another speciinea)
66
115
100 : 173
Common domestic duck . .
127
158
100 : 124
In these domesticated birds, the considerably lessened weight of
the bones of the wing (^. e. on an average, twenty-five per cent, of
their proper proportional weight), as well as their slightly lessened
length, relatively to the leg-bones, might follow, not from any
actual decrease in the wing-b’ones, but from the increased weight
and length of the bones of the legs. The first of the two tables on
the next page shows that the leg-bones relatively to the weight of
the entire skeleton have really increased in weight ; but the second
table shows that according to the same standard the wing-bones
have also really decreased in weight; so that the relative dis-
proportion shown in the foregoing tables between the wing and leg-
bones, in comparison with those of the wild duck, is partly due to
the increase in weight and length of the leg-bones, and partly to
the decrease in weight and length of the wing-bones.
With respect to the two following tables, I may first state that I
tested them by taking another skeleton of a wild duck and of a
common domestic duck, and by comparing the weight of all the
bones of the leg with all those of the wings, and the result was the
same. In the first of these tables we see that the leg-bones in each
case havti increased in actual weight. It might have been expected
tliat, with the increased or decreased weight of the entire skeleton,
the leg-bones would have become proportionally heavier or lighter ;
but their greater weight in all the breeds relatively to the other
bones can be accounted for only by these domestic birds having
used their legs in walking and standing much more than the wild,
for they never fly, and the more artificial breeds rarely swim. In
the second table we see, with the exception of one case, a plain
reduction in the weight of the bones of the wing, and this no doubt
has resulted from their lessened use. The one exceptional casc;
Chap. VIII.
EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE.
301
Name of Breed.
Wciglit of entire
Skeleion.
(N.B. One Metatar-
sus and Foot was
removed irom each
skeleton, as it had
been accidentally lost
in t'\ 0 cases.)
Weight of
Femur,
ribia, and
Metatarsus.
Or a«
Grains.
Grains.
Wild mallard
889
54
1000 ; 61
Aylesbury
1925
164
1000 :-85
'I'ulted (Dutch)
1404
111
1000 : 79
Penguin
871
75
1000 : 86
Call (from Mr. Fox) .. ..
717
57
lOuO ; 79
Weight of
Weight of Skeleton
Humerus,
as above.
Radius and
Metacarpus.
Grains.
Grains.
Wild mallard
839
97
1000 : 115
Aylesbury
1925
204
1000 : 105
Tufted (Dutch)
1404
148
ICOO : 105
Penguin
871
90
1000 : 103
Call (from Mr. Baker)
914
100
1000 : 109
Call (from Mr. Fox) . .
717
92
1000 : 129
namely, in one of the Call ducks, is in truth no exception, for this
bird was constantly in the habit of flying about ; and I have seen
it day after clay rise from my grounds, and fly for a long time in
circles of more than a mile in diameter. In this Call duck there is
not only no decrease, but an actual increase in the weight of the
wing-bones relatively to those of the wild-duck ; and this probably
is consequent on the remarkable lightness and thinness of all the
bones of the skeleton.
Lastly, I weighed the furculum, coracoids, and scapula of a wild
duck and of a common domestic duck, and I found that their
weight, relatively to that of the whole skeleton, was as one hundred
in the form^er to eighty-nine in the latter; this shows that these
bones in the domestic duck have been reduced eleven per cent, of
their due proportional weight. The prominence of the crest of the
sternum, relatively to its length, is also much reduced in all the
domestic breeds. These changes have evidently been caused by
the lessened use of the wings.
It is well known that several birds, belonging to different
Orders, and inhabiting oceanic islands, have their wings
greatly- reduced in size and are incapable of flight. I sug-
gested in my ‘ Origin of Species ’ that, as these birds are not
302
DOMESTIC GOOSE.
Chap, vnr
persecuted by any enemies, the reduction of their wings had
probably been caused by gradual disuse. Hence, during the
earlier stages of the process of reduction, such birds would
jmobably have resembled our domesticated ducks in the state
of their organs of flight. 'J'his is the case with the water-
hen (Gallinvla nesiotis) of Tristan d’Acunha, which “can
flutter a little, but obviously uses its legs, and not its wings,
as a mode of escape.” Now Mr. Sclater^® finds in this bird
that the wings, sternum, and coracoids arc all reduced in
length, and the crest of the sternum in depth, in comparison
with the same bones in the European water-hen (6r. cldoropus).
On the other hand, the thigh-bones and pelvis are increased
in length, the former by four lines, relatively to the same
bones in the common water-hen. Hence in the skeleton of
this natural species nearly the same changes have occurred,
only carried a little further, as with onr domestic ducks, and
in this latter case I presume no one will dispute that they
have resulted from the lessened use of the wings and the in-
creased use of the legs.
The Goose.
This bird deserves some notice, as hardly any other anciently
domesticated bird or quadruped has varied so little, d'hat
geese were anciently domesticated we know from certain
verses in Homer ; and from these birds having been kept
(388 B.c.) in the Capitol at Eome as sacred to Juno, which
sacredness implies great antiquity. That the goose has
varied in some degree, we may infer from naturalists not
being unanimous with respect to its wild, parent-foi m ;
though the difficulty is chiefly due to the existence of three
or four closely 'allied wild European species. A large
majority of capable judges are convinced that our geese are
descended from the wild Grey-leg goose (A. ferns) ; the
‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soe,,’ 1861, p.
261.
20 ‘ Ceylon,’ by 8ir J. E. Tennent,
1859, vol. i. p. 485; also J. Crawfurd
on the ‘ Kelation of Domest. Animals
to Civilisation,’ read before Brit.
Assoc. 1860. See also ‘ Ornamental
Poultry,’ by Kev. E. S, Di.xon, 1848,
p. 132. The goose figured on the
Egyptian monuments seems to have
been the Ked goose of Egypt.
21 Maegillivray’s ‘British Birds,’
vol. iv. p. 593.
Chap VTIL
DOMESTIC GOOSE.
young of which can easily be tamed. This species, when
crossed with the domestic goose, produced in the Zoological
Gardens, as I was assured in 1849, perfectly fertile offspring.^^
Yarrell has observed that the lower part of the trachea of
rlie domestic goose is sometimes flattened, and that a ring of
white feathers sometimes surrounds the base of the beab.
4’]iese characters seem at first sight good indications of a
cross at some former period with the white-fronted goose
{A. albifrons) ; but the white ring is variable in this latter
species, and we must not overlook the law of analogous varia-
tion ; that is, of one species assuming some of the chai actors
of allied species.
As the goose has proved so little flexible in its organization
under long-continned domestication, the amount of variation
which it has undergone may be worth giving. It has increased
in size and in productiveness and varies from white to a
dusky colour. Several observers^® have stated that the
gander is more frequently white than the goose, and that
when old it almost invariably becomes white ; but this is not
the case with the parent-form, the A. ferus. Here, again, the
law of analogous variation may have come into play, as the
almost snow-white male of the Kock goose (^Bernida antarctica)
standing on the sea- shore by his dusky partner is a sight
well known to those who have traversed the sounds of Tierra
del Fuego and the Falkland Islands. Some geese have top-
knots ; and the skull beneath, as before stated, is perforated.
A snb-breed has lately been formed with the feathers reversed
at the back of the head and neck.^"^ The beak varies a little
in size, and is of a yellower tint than in the wild species ; but
Mr. A. Strickland (‘Annals and
]\lag. of Nat. Hist.,’ 3rd series, vol,
iii. 1859, p, 122) reared some young
wild geese, and found them in habits
and in all characters identical with
ihe domestic goose,
2® See also Hunter’s ‘ Essays,’ edited
by Owen, vol. ii. p. 322.
2+ YarrelTs ‘ British Birds,’ vol. iii.
p. 142.
2® L. Llfjyd, ‘ Scandinavian Adven-
tures,’ 1851, vol. ii. p. 413, says that
the wild goose lays from five to eiglit
eggs, which is a much fewer number
than that laid by our domestic goose,
2*5 The Rev. L. Jenyns seems fiivt
to have made this observation in Ins
‘British Animals.’ See also Yarrell,
and Dixon in his ‘ Ornamental Poul-
try ’ (p. 139), and ‘ Gardener’s Chroni-
cle,’ 1857, p. 45,
2^ Mr. Bartlet exhibited the head
and neck of a bird thus characterised
before the Zoological Soc., Feb. 1800,
304
DOMESTIC GOOSE.
Chap. VIII.
its colour ;ni(l that of the' legs are Voth slightly variable.^'’
This latter fact deserves attention, hecanse the colour of th<3
logs and beak is highly serviceable in discriminating the
several closely allied wild forms. At our Shows two breeds
are exhibited; viz. the Embden and Toulouse; but tliey
differ in nothing except colour.^” hecently a smaller aril
singular variety has been imported ft’oin Sebastopol, with
the scapular feathers (as I hoar from JMr. Tegetmeier, who
sent me specimens) greatly elongated, curled, and even
spirally twisted. The margins of these feathers are rendered
plumose by the divergence of the barbs and bai-bulos, so that
they resemble in some degree those on the back of the black
Australian swan. These feathers are likewise remaikablo
from the central shaft, which is excessively thin and trans-
parent, being split into fine filaments, which, after running for
a space free, sometimes coalesce again. It is a curious fact that
these filaments are regularly clothed on each side with fine
down or barbules, precisely like those on the proper barbs of
the feather. This structure of the feathers is transmitted to
half-bred birds. In Gall us sonneratii the barbs and barbules
blend together, and form thin horny plates of the same nature
with the shaft : in this variety of the goose, the shaft divides
into filaments which acquire barbules, and thus resemble true
barbs.
Although the domestic goose certainly differs somewhat
from any known wild species, yet the amount of variation
which it has undergone, as compared with that of most
domesticated animals, is singularly small. This fact can bo
partially accounted for by selection not having come largely
into play. Birds of all kinds which present many distinct
races are valued as pets or ornaments ; no one makes a pet of
the goose; the name, indeed, in more langujiges than one, is
a term of reproach. The goose is valued for its size and
llavour, for the whiteness of its feathers which adds to their
W. Thompson, ‘ Natural Hist, of and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’ 3rd series,
Iri.dand,’ 1851, vol. iii. p. 31. The vol iii. 1859 p. 122.
Rev. K. S. Di.xon gave me some infoi- ‘ Poultry Chronicle,’ vol. i., 1854.
mation on the v'arying colour of the p. 498; vol. iii. p. 210.
beak and legs. ‘The Cottage Gardener,’ Sept
Mr. A. Strickland, in ‘Annals 4th, 1860, p. 318.
Chap. VIII.
PEACOCK.
305
value, and for its prolificness and tameness. Tn all these
points the goose dilfers from the wild parent-form ; and these
are the points which have been selected. Even in ancient
limes the Roman gourmands valued the liver of the ivhite
goose; and Pierre Belon^^ in 1555 speaks of two varieties,
one of which was larger, more fecund, and of a better coloiii'
than the other ; and he expressly states that good managers
attended to the colour of their goslings, so that they might
know which to preserve and select for breeding.
The Peacock.
This is another bird which has hardly varied under domesti-
cation, except in sometimes being white or piebald. Mr.
Waterhouse carefully compared, as he informs me, skins of
the wild Indian and domestic bird, and they were identical
in every respect, except that the plumage of the latter was
perhaps rather thicker. Whether our birds are descended
from those introduced into Europe in the time of Alexander,
or have been subsequently imported, is doubtful. They do
not breed very freely with us, and are seldom kept in large
numbers, — circumstances which would greatly interfere with
the gradual selection and formation of new breeds.
There is one strange fact with respect to the peacock,
namely, the occasional appearance in England of the
“japanned” or “black-shouldered” kind. This form has
lately been named on the high authority of Mr. Sclater as a
distinct species, viz. Favo nigri^ennis, which he believes will
hereafter be found wild in some country, but not in India,
where it is certainly unknown. The males of these japanned
birds differ conspicuously from the common peacock in the
colour of their secondary wing-feathers, scapulars, wing-
coverts, and thighs, and are I think more beautiful ; they
are rather smaller than the common sort, and are always
beaten by them in their battles, as I hear from the Hon.
A. S. G. Canning. The females are much paler coloured than
those of the common kind. . Both sexes, as Mr. Canning
‘ L’Hist. de la Nature desOiseaux,’ being preferred by the Romans, se^
p-ar P. Belon, 1555, p. 156. With Isid. GeofFroy St. -Hilaire, ‘ Hist Nat.
respeet to the livers of white geese Gen.,’ tom. iii. p. 58,
21
306
PEACOCK.
Chap. VIII.
informs me, are white when they leave the egg, and they differ
from the young of the white variety only in having a peculiar
pinkish tinge on their wings. These japanned birds, though
appearing suddenly in flocks of the common kind, propagate
tlieir kind quite truly. Although they do not resemble
the hybrids which have been raised between P. eristatus and
muticus, nevertheless they are in some respects intermediate in
character between these two sjoecies ; and this fact favours,
as Mr. Sclater believes, the view that they form a distinct
and natural species.
On the other hand, Sir E. Heron states that this breed
suddenly appeared within his memory in Lord Brownlow’s
large stock of pied, white, and common peacocks. The same
thing occurred in Sir J. Trevelyan’s flock composed entirely
of the common kind, and in Mr. Thornton’s stock of common
and pied peacocks. It is remarkable that in these two latter
instances the black- shouldered kind, though a smaller and
weaker bird, increased, “ to the extinction of the previously
existing breed.” I have also received through Mr. Sclater a
statement from Mr. Hudson Gurney that he reared many
years ago a pair of black-shouldered peacocks from the
common kind; and another ornithologist. Prof. A. Newton,
states that, five or six years ago, a female bird, in all respects
similar to the female of the blaclv-shouldered kind, was
produced from a stock of common peacocks in his possession,
which during more than twenty years had not been crossed
with birds of any other strain. Mr. Jenner Weir informs
me that a peacock at Blackheath whilst young was white,
but as it became older gradually assumed the characters of the
black-shouldered variety ; both its parents were common
peacocks. Lastly, Mr. Canning has given a case of a female
of this same variety appearing in Ireland in a flock of the
ordinary kind.^“ Here, then, we have seven well authenticated
Mr. Sclater on the black-shoul-
dcreJ peacock of Latham. ‘ Proc.
Zoolog. Soc.,’ April 24th, 1880. Mr.
Swinhoe at one time believed (‘ Ibis,’
July, 1868) that this kind of pea-
fowl was found wild in Cochin China,
but he has since informed me that he
feels very doubtful on this head.
‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ April 14tli,
1835.
The Field, May 6th, 1871. I
am much indebted to Mr. Canning
for inhumation with respect to his
birds.
Chap. VIII.
PEACOCK.
.307
cases in Great Britain of japanned birds, having suddenly
appeared within recent times in flocks of the common pea-
fowl. This variety mnst also have formerly appeared
in Europe, for Mr. Canning has seen an old picture, and
another is referred to in the ‘ Field,’ with this vaiiet}-
represented. These facts seem to me to indicate that the
japanned peacock is a strongly marked variety or “ sport,”
which tends at all times and in many places to. reappear.
This view is supported by the young being at first white
like the young of the white breed, which is undoubtedly a
variation. If, on the other hand, we believe the japanned
peacock to be a distinct species, we must suppose that in all the
above cases the common breed had at some former period been
crossed by it, but had lost every trace of the cross ; yet
that the offspring of these birds suddenly and completely
reacquired through reversion the characters of P. ni/jripennis.
I have heard of no other such case in the animal or vegetable
kingdom. To perceive the full improbability of such an
occurrence, we may suppose that a breed of dogs had been
crossed at some former period with a wolf, but had lost every
trace of the wolf-like character, yet that the breed gave birth
in seven instances in the same country, within no great
length of time, to a wolf perfect in every character ; and we
must further suppose that in two of the cases, the newly
produced wolves afterwards spontaneously increased to
such an extent as to lead to the extinction of the parent
breed of dogs. So remarkable a bird as the P. Nigripennis.
when first imported, would have realized a large price ; it is
therefore improbable that it should have been silently in-
troduced and its history subsequently lost. On the whole
the evidence seems to me, as it did to Sir E. Heron, to be
decisive in favour of the japanued or black-shouldered breed
being a variation, induced by some unknown cause. On this
view, the case is the most remarkable one ever recorded of
the abrupt appearance of a new form, which so closely
resembles a true species that it has deceived one of the most
experienced of living ornithologists.
308
TURKEY.
Chap. VITI.
The Turkey.
It seems fairly will established by Mr. Gould, that the
turkey, in accordance with the history of its first intro-
duction, is descended from a wild Mexican form, which had
been domesticated by the natives before the discovery
of America, and which is now generally ranked as a local
race, and not as a distinct species. However this may be,
the case deserves notice because in the United States wild
male turkeys sometimes court the domestic hens, which are
descended from the Mexican form, “and are generally received
by them with great pleasure.” Several accounts have
likewise been published of young birds, reared in the United
States from the eggs of the wild species, crossing and com-
mingling with the common breed. In England, also, this
same species has been kept in several parks ; from two of
which the Eev. W. D. Fox procured birds, and they crossed
freely with the common domestic kind, and during many
years afterwards, as he informs me, the turkeys in his neigh-
bourhood clearly showed traces of their crossed parentage.
We here have an instance of a domestic race being modified
by a cross with a distinct wild race or species. F. Michaux
suspected in 1802 that the common domestic turkey was not
descended from the United States species alone, but likewise
from a southern form, and he went so far as to believe that
English and French turkeys differed from having different
proportions of the blood of the two parent-forms.
English turkeys are smaller than either wild form. They
have not varied in any great degree ; but there are some
breeds which can be distinguished-- as Norfolks, Suffolks,
Whites, and Copper- coloured (or Cambridge), all of which.
‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ April 8th,
1856, p. 61. Prof. Baird believes (as
quoted in Tegetmeier’s‘ Poultry Book,’
1866, p. 269) that our turkeys are
descended from a West Indian species
now-extinct. But besides the impro-
bability of a bird haAung long ago
become extinct in these large and
luxuriant islands, it appears (as we
Ehall presently see) that the turkey
degenerates in India, and this fact
indicates that it was not aboriginally
an inhabitant of the lowlands of the
tropics.
Audubon’s ‘Ornithological Bio-,
graphy.,’ vol. i., 1831, pp. 4-13; and
‘ Naturalist’s Library,’ vol. xiv., Birds,
p. 138.
F. Michaux, ‘ TrarvHs in N. Ame-
rica,’ 1802, Eng. translat., p. 217.
Chap. VIII.
TURKEY.
309
if precluded from crossing with other breeds propagate their
kind truly. Of these kinds, the most distinct is the small,
hardy, dull-black Norfolk turkey, of which the chickens are
black, occasionally with white patches about the head. The
other breeds scarcely differ except in colour, and their chickens
are generally mottled all over with brownish-grey.^® The in -
ferior tail-coverts vary in number, and according to a G erman
superstition the hen lays as many eggs as tho cock- has
feathers of this kind.^® Albin in 1738, and Temminck within a
much later period, describe a beautiful breed, dusky-yellowish,
brown above and white beneath, with a large top-knot of
soft plumose feather. The spurs of the male were rudimentary.
This breed has been for a long time extinct in Europe; but
a living specimen has lately been imported from the east
coast of Africa, which still retains the top-knot and the
same general colouring and rudimentary spurs.^^ Mr. Wilmot
has described a white turkey-cock having a crest formed of
“ feathers about four inches long, with bare quills, and a tuft
of soft white down growing at the end.” Many of the
young birds inherited this kind of crest, but afterwards
it fell off or was pecked out by the other birds. This is an
interesting case, as with care a new breed might probably
have been formed ; and a top-knot of this nature would have
been to a certain extent analogous to that borne by the males
in several allied genera, such as Euplocomus, Lophophorus,
and Pavo.
Wild turkeys, believed in every instance to have been im-
ported from the United States, have been kept in the parks
of Lords Powis, Leicester, Hill, and Derby. The Eev. W. D.
Fox procured birds from the two first-named parks, and he
informs me that they certainly differed a little from each
other in the shape of their bodies and in the barred plumage
on their wings. These birds likewise differed from Lord
Hill’s stock. Some of the latter kept at Oulton by Sir P.
‘ Ornamental Poetry,’ by the • Oct. 31, 1868, p. 233 ; and Mr.
Rev. E. S. Dixon, 1848, p. 34. Tegetmeier in the ‘Field,’ July 17,
Bechstein, ‘ Natui'gesch. Deutsch- 1869, p. 46.
lands,’ B. iii., 1793, s. 309. ‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1852, p
Mr. Bartlett in ‘ Land and Water,’ 699 .
310
GUINEA FOWL.
Chap. VIIU
Eger ton, though precluded from crossing Avith common
til] keys, occasionally produced much paler-coloured birds,
and one that was almost white, but not an albino. These
lialf-wild turkeys, in thus differing slightly from each other,
])resent an analogous case with the wild cattle kept in the
several British parks. We must suppose that such differences
have resulted from the prevention of free intercrossing
between birds ranging over a wide area, and from the
changed conditions to which they have been exposed in
England. In India the climate has apparently wrought a
still greater change in the turkey, for it is described by Mr.
Blyth^^ as being much degenerated in size, “utterly in-
capable of rising on the wing,” of a black, colour, and “ with
the long pendulous appendages over the beak enormously
developed.”
The Guinea Fowl.
The domesticated Guinea fowl is now believed by some
naturalists to be descended om the Numida ptilorliynca, which
inhabits very hot, and, in parts, extremely arid districts in
Eastern Africa ; consequently it has been exposed in this
country to extremely different conditions of life. Nevertheless
it has hardly varied at all, except in the plumage being either
paler or darker- coloured. It is a singular fact that this bird
varies more in colour in the West Indies and on the Spanish
Main, under a hot though humid climate, than in Europe.^^
The Guinea fowl has become thoroughly i’eral in Jamaica and
in St. Domingo, and has diminished in size; the legs are
black, whereas the legs of the aboriginal African bird are
said to be grey. This small change is worth notice on
account of the often-repeated statement that all feral animals
invariably revert in every character to their original type.
E. Blyth, in ‘Annals and Mag.
of Nat. Hist.,’ 1847, vol. xx. p. 391.
Roulin makes this remark in
‘ Mem. de dir ers Savans, I’Acad. des
Sciences,’ tom. vi., 1835, p. 349. Mr.
Hill, of Spanish Town, in a letter to
me, describes five varieties of the
Guinea fowl in .Tan aica. I have seen
singular pale-coloured varieties im-
ported from Barba loes and Demerara.
For St. Domingo, see M. A.
Salle, in ‘ Proc. Zoolog. Soc.’ 1857, p.
236. Mr. Hill remarks ro me, in his
letter, on the colour of the legs of tht
feral birds in Jamaica.
Ghap. VIII.
CANARY BIRD.
31J
The Canary Bird.
As this bird has been recently domesticated, namely, within
the last 350 years, its variability deserves notice. It has been
crossed with nine or ten other species of Fringillidae, and
some of the hybrids are almost completely fertile ; but we
have no evidence that any distinct breed has originated from
such crosses. Notwithstanding the modern domestication of
the canary, many varieties have been produced ; even before
the year 1718 a list of twenty-seven varieties was published
in France,^® and in 1779 a long schedule of the desired quali-
ties was printed by the London Canary Society, so that
methodical selection has been practised during a considerable
period. The greater number of the varieties differ only in
colour and in the markings of their plumage. Some breeds
however, differ in shape, such as the hooped or bowed canaries,
and the Belgian canaries with their much elongated bodies.
Mr. Brent^^ measured one of the latter and found it eight
inches in length, whilst the wild canary is only five and a
quarter inches long. There are top-knotted canaries, and it is
a singular fact that, if two top-knotted birds are matched, the
young, instead of having very fine top-knots, are generally
bald, or even have a wound on their heads. It would
appear as if the top-knot were due to some morbid condition,
which is increased to an injurious degree when two birds in
this state are paired. There is a feather-footed breed, and
another with a kind of frill running down the breast. One
other character deserves notice from being confined to one
period of life, and from being strictly inherited at the same
period ; namely, the wing and tail feathers in prize canaries
being black, “ but this colour is retained only until the first
moult; once moulted, the peculiarity ceases.”^^ Canaries
Ml’. B. P Brent, ‘The Canary,
British Finches,’ &c., pp. 21, 30.
‘Cottage Gardener,’ Dec. 11th,
1855, p. 184: an account is herp
given of all the varieties. For many
measurements of the wild birds, see
Mr. E. Vernon Harcourt, ibid., Dec.
25th, 1855, p. 223.
Bechstein, ‘ Naturgesch. der Stu-
benvogel,’ 1840, s. 243 ; see s. 252, on
the inherited song of Canary-birds.
With respect to their baldness, see
also W. Kidd’s ‘Treatise on Song-
Birds.’
W. Kidd’s ‘Treatise on Song-
Birds,’ p. 18
312
GOLD-FISH.
Chap. VIII.
dirt’cr much in disposition and character, and in some small
degree in song. They produce eggs three or four times during
the year.
Gold-Fish.
Besidks mamiTxals and birds, only a few animals belonging to
the other great classes have been domesticated; but to show
that it is an almost universal law that animals, when removed
from their natural conditions of life, vary, and that races can
be formed when selection is applied, it is necessary to say a
few words on gold-fish, bees, and silk-moths.
Gold-fish (^Gyprinus auralus) were introduced into Europe
only two or three centuries ago ; but they have been kept in
confinement from an ancient period in China. Mr. Blyth
suspects, from the analogous variation of other fishes, that
golden-coloured fish do not occur in a state of nature. These
fishes frequently live under the most unnatural conditions,
and their variability in colour, size, and in some important
points of structure is very great. M. Sauvigny has described
and given coloured drawings of no less than eighty-nine
varieties. Many of the varieties, however, such as triple
tail-fins, &c., ought to be called monstrosities ; but it is diffi-
cult to draw any distinct line between a variation and a
monstrosity. As gold-fish are kept for ornament or curiosity,
and as “ the Chinese are just the people to have secluded a
chance variety of any kind, and to have matched and paired
from it,” it might have been predicted that selection
would have been largely practised in the formation of new
breeds ; and this is the case. In an old Chinese work it is
said that fish with vermilion scales were first raised in con-
finement during the Sung dynasty (which commenced a.d.
960), “and now they are cultivated in families every where for
the sake of ornament.” In another and more ancient work, i t is
said that “ there is not a household where the gold-fish is not
cultivated, in rivalry as to its colour, and as a source of
profit,” &c.®^ Although many breeds exist, it is a singular
The ‘Indian Field,’ 1858, p. 255. 1858, p. 255.
Yarrell’s ‘ British Fishes,’ vol. i. W. F. Mayers, ‘Chinese Notes
p. 319. and Qu.eries,’ Aug, 1868; p. 123.
Mr. Blyth, in the ‘ Indian Field.’
Chap. VIIL
HIVE-BEES.
31o^
fact that the variations are often not inherited. Sir R.
Heron kept many of these fishes, and placed all the de-
formed ones, namely, those destitute of dorsal fins and tliose
furnished with a double anal fin, or triple tail, in a pond by
themselves ; but they did “ not produce a greater proportion
of deformed offspring than the perfect fishes.”
Passing over an almost infinite diversity of colour, we meet
with the most extraordinary modifications of structure. Tlius,
out of about two dozen specimens bought in London, Mr.
Yarrell observed some with the dorsal fin extending along
more than half the length of the back : others with this fin
reduced to only five or six rays : and one with no dorsal fin.
The anal fins are sometimes double, and the tail is often triple.
This latter deviation of structure seems generally to occur
“ at the expense of the whole or part of some other fin ; ”
but Bory de Saint- Vincent saw at Madrid gold-fish furnished
with a dorsal fin and a triple tail. One variety is characterised
by a hump on its back near the head ; and the Rev. L.
Jenyns has described a most singular variety, imported
from China, almost globular in form like a Diodon, with “ the
fleshy part of the tail as if entirely cut away ? the caudal fin
being set on a little behind the dorsal and immediately above
the anal.” In this fish the anal and caudal fins were double ;
the anal fin being attached to the body in a vertical line ;
the eyes also were enormously large and protuberant.
Hive-Bees.
Bees have been domesticated from an ancient period; if
indeed their state can be considered one of domestication, for
they search for their own food, with the exception of a little
generally given to them during the winter. Their habitation
is a hive instead of a hole in a tree. Bees, however, have
.■54 ( Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ May 25th, ‘ Observations in Nat. Hist.,’
184-2. 18-16, p. 211. Dr. Gray has described,
Varrell’s ‘British Fishes,’ vol. i. in ‘Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’
p. .619. 1860, p. 151, a nearly similar variety,
‘ Diet. Class. d’Hist. Nat.,’ tom. but destitute of a dorsal fin.
V. p. 276.
314
HIVE-BEES.
Chap. VIII.
been transported into almost every quarter of the world, so
that climate onglit to have produced whatever direct effect
it is capable of producing. It is frequently asserted that
the bees in different parts of Great Britain differ in size,
colour, and temper ; and Godron^® says that they are
generally larger in the south than in other parts of F ranee ;
it has also been asserted that the little brown bees of High
Burgundy, when transported to La Bresse become largo
and yellow in the second generation. But these statements
require confirmation. As far as size is concerned, it is known
that bees produced in very old combs are smaller, owing to
the cells having become smaller from the successive old
cocoons. The best authorities^® concur that, with the
exception of the Ligurian lace or species, present^ to be
mentioned, distinct breeds do not exist in Britain or on the
Continent. There is, however, even in the same stock, some
variability in colour. Thus, Mr. Woodbury states,®® that he
has several times seen queen bees of the common kind annu-
lated with yellow-like Ligurian queens, and the latter dark-
coloured like common bees. He has also observed variations
in the colour of the drones, without any corresponding differ-
ence in the queens or workers of the same hive. The great
apiarian, Dzierzon, in answer to my queries on this subject,
says,®^ that in Germany bees of some stocks are decidedly
dark, whilst others are remarkable for their yellow colour.
Bees also s&ein to differ in habits in different districts, for
Dzierzon adds, “ If many stocks with their offspring are more
inclined to swarm, whilst others are richer in honey, so that
some bee-keepers even distinguish between swarming and
honey-gathering bees, this is a habit which has become second
nature, caused by the customary mode of keeping the bees
‘De I’Espfece,’ 1859, p. 459.
With respect to the bees of Burgundy,
sec M. Gerard, art. ‘ Espece,’ iu ‘ Diet.
Univers. d’Hist. Nat.’
See a discussion on this subject,
in answer to a question of mine, in
‘.Journal of Horticulture,’ 1862, pp.
225-242; also Mr. Bevan Fox, in
litto, 1862, p. 284
This excellent observer may be
implicitly trusted ; see ‘ Journal of
Horticulture,’ July 14th, 1863, p. 39.
‘Journal of Horticulture,’ Sept.
9th, 1862, p. 463; see also Herr
Kleine on same subject (Nov. 11th, p.
643), who sums up, that, though
there is some variability in colour, no
constant or perceptible differences can
be detected in the bees of Germany.
Chap. VIII.
HIVE-BEES.
815
and the pasturage of the district. For example, '^vhat a
difference in this respect one may joerceive to exist between
the bees of the Liineburg heath and those of this country ! ”
“ Eemoving an old queen and substituting a young
one of the current year is here an infallible mode of keeping
the strongest stock from swarming and preventing drone-
breeding ; whilst the same means if adopted in Hanover
would certainly be of no avail. ’ I procured a hive full of
dead bees from Jamaica, where they have long been natural-
ised, and, on carefully comparing them under the microscope
with my own bees, 1 could detect not a trace of difference.
This remarkable uniformity in the hive-bee, wherever kept,
may probably be accounted for by the great difficulty, or
rather impossibility, of bringing selection into play by pairing
particular queens and drones, for these insects unite only
during flight. Nor is there any record, with a single partial
exception, of any person having separated and bred from a
hive in which the workers presented some appreciable differ-
ence. In order to form a new breed, seclusion from other
bees would, as we now know, be indispensable ; for since the
introduction of the Ligurian bee into Germany and England,
it has been found that the drones wander at least two miles
from their own hives, and often cross with the queens of the
common bee.®^ The Ligurian bee. although perfectly fertile
when crossed with the common kind, is ranked by most
naturalists as a distinct species, whilst by others it is ranked
as a variety : but this form need not here be noticed, as there
is no reason to believe that it is the product of domestica-
tion. The Egyptian and some other bees are likewise ranked
by Dr. Gerstacker,^^ but not by other highly competent
judges, as geographical races ; he grounds his conclusion
in chief part on the fact that in certain districts, as in the
Crimea and Ehodes, they var}^ so much in colour, that the
several geographical races can be closely connected by inter-
mediate forms.
I ha ‘re alluded to a single instance of the separation and
Mr. Woodbury has published ‘ Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,
several such accounts in ‘Journal of 3ril scries, vol xi. p. 339.
Hortif ulture,’ 1361 and 1862.
816
SILK-MOTHS.
CllAF. Vfll,
preservation of a particular stock of bees. Mr. ] jowe l^ro-
cured some bees from a cottager a few miles from Edinl)urgh,
and perceived that they differed from the common bee in the
hairs on the head and thorax being lighter coloured and more
profuse in quantity. From the date of the introduction of
the Ligurian bee into Great Britain we may feel sure that
these bees liad not been crossed with this form. Mr. Lowe
propagated this variety, but unfortunately did not separate
the stock from his other bees, and after three generations the
new character was almost completely lost. Nevertheless, as
he adds, “ a great number of the bees still retain traces,
though faint, of the original colony.” This case shows us
what could probably be effected by careful and long-
continued selection applied exclusively to the workers, for,
as we have seen, queens and drones cannot be selected and
Silk-Moths.
These insects are in several respects interesting to us, more
especially because they have varied largely at an early period
of life, and the variations have been inherited at correspond-
ing periods. As the value of the silk-moth depends entirely
on the cocoon, every change in its structure and qualities has
been carefully attended to, and races differing much in the
cocoon, but hardly at all in the adult state, have been pro-
duced. With the races of most other domestic animals, the
young resemble each other closely, whilst the adults differ
much.
It would be useless, even if it were possible, to describe all
the many kinds of silk -worms. Several distinct species exist
in India and China which produce useful silk, and some of
these are capable of freely crossing with the common silk-
moth, as has been recently ascertained in France. Captain
Hutton states that throughout the world at least six species
have been domesticated ; and he believes that the silk-moths
reared in Europe belong to two or three species. This, how-
‘ The Cottage Gardener,’ May, ‘ Transact. Entoniolog. Soc.,’ 3rd
1800, p. 110; and ditto in ‘Journal series, vol. iii. pp. 143-173, and pp.
of Ilort.,’ 1862, p. 242. 295-331.
Chap. VIII.
THEIR DIFFERENCES.
317
ever, is not the opinion of several capable judges who have
particular!}^ attended to the cultivation of this insect in
France ; and hardly accords with some facts presently to he
given.
The common silk-moth {Bomhyx mori) was brought to Con-
stantinople in the sixth century, whence it was carried into
Italy, and in 1494 into France.®® Everything has been
favourable for the variation of this insect. It is believed
to have been domesticated in China as long ago as 2700 b.c.
It has been kept under unnatuial and diversified conditions
of life, and has been transported into many countries. There
is reason to believe that the nature of the food given to the
caterpillar influences to a certain extent the character of the
hreed.®'^ Disuse has apparently aided in checking the develop-
ment of the wings. But the most important element in the
production of the many now existing, much modified races,
no doubt has been the close attention which has long been
applied in many countries to every promising variation.
The care taken in Europe in the selection of the best cocoons
and moths for breeding is notorious,®* and the production of
eggs is followed as a distinct trade in parts of France. I
have made inquiries through Dr. Falconer, and am assured
that in India the natives are equally careful in the process
of selection. In China the production of eggs is confined to
certain favourable districts, and the raisers are precluded by
law from producing silk, so that their whole attention may
be necessarily given up to this one object.®^
The following details on the differences between the several
breeds are taken, when not stated to the contrary, from M. Eobinet’s
excellent work,'^® which bears every sign of care and large experi-
ence. The eggs in the different races vary in colour, in shape
(being round, elliptic or oval), and in size. The eggs laid in June
in the south of France, and in July in the central provinces, do not
Godron, ‘ De I’Espece,’ 1S59, tom. xS'ee, for instance, M. A., do Qnatre-
i. p. 460. The antiquity of the silk- fages’ ‘Etudes sur les Maladies actu-
worm in China is given on the elles du Ver k Soie,’ 1859, p. 101.
authority of Stanislas Julien. ‘ My authorities for the statements
See the remarks of Prof. West- will be given in the chapter on Selec-
wood, Gen. Hearsey, and others, at tion.
the meeting of the Entomolog. Soc. of ‘ Manuel de I’Educateur de Vers
London, July, 1361. 4 Soie,’ 1848.
318
SILK-MOTIIS.
Chap. VIII.
liatcli until the following spring; and it is in vain, says M. Eohinet,
to expose them to a temperature gradually raised, in order that the
caterpillai' may bo quickly developed. Yet occasionally, without
any known cause, batches of eggs are produced, which immediately
begin to undergo the proper changes, and are hatched in from
twenty to thirty days. From these and some other analogous facts
it may be concluded that the Trevoltini silkworms of Italy, of which
the caterpillars are hatched in from fifteen to twenty days, do not
necessarily form, as has been maintained, a distinct species.
Although the breeds which live in temperate countries produce
eggs which cannot be immediately hatched by artificial heat, yet
v.'hen they are removed to and reared in a hot country they
gradually acquire the character of quick development, as in the
Trevoltini races.''’
Caterpillars. — These vary greatly in size and colour. The skin
is generally white, sometimes mottled with black or grey, and
occasionally quite black. The colour, however, as M. Eobinet
asserts, is not constant, even in perfectly pure breeds ; except in
the race tigree, so called from being marked with transverse black
stripes. As the general colour of the caterpillar is not correlated
with that of the silk,'^^ this character is disregarded by cultivators,
and has not been fixed by selection. Captain Hutton, in the paper
before referred to, has argued with much force that the dark tiger-
like marks, which so frequently appear during the later moults in
the caterpillars of various breeds, are due to reversion ; for the
caterpillars of several allied wild species of Bombyx are marked
and coloured in this manner. He separated some caterpillars with
the tiger-like marks, and in the succeeding spring (pp. 149, 298)
nearly all the caterpillars reared from them were dark- brindled, and
the tints became still darker in the third generation. The moths
reared from these caterpillars also became darker, and resembled
in colouring the wild B. huHoni. On this view of the tiger-like
marks being due to reversion, the persistency with which they are
transmitted is intelligible.
Several years ago Mrs. Whitby took great pains in breeding
silkworms on a large scale, and she informed me that some of her
caterpillars had dark eyebrows. This is probably the first step in
reversion towards the tiger-like marks, and I was curious to know
whether so trifling a character would be inherited. At my request
Robinet, ibid., pp. 12, 318. I
may a Id that the eggs of N. American
silkworms taken to the Sandwich
Islands produced moths at very irre-
gular periods ; and the moths thus
raised yielded eggs which were even
worse in this respect. Some were
hatched in ten days, and others not
until after the lapse of many months.
No doubt a regular early character
would ultimately have been acquired.
See review in ‘Athenajum,’ 1844, ]».
329, of J. Jarves’ ‘Scenes in th.e
Sandwich Islands.’
‘ The Art of rearing Silk-worms,’
translated from Count Dandolo, 1825,
p. 23.
‘Transact. Enl. Soc.,’ ut supra,
pp. 153, 308.
Chap. VIII.
THEIR DIFFERENCES.
319
she separated in 1848 twenty of these caterpillars, and having kept
the moths separate, bred from them. Of the many caterpillars
thus reared, “every one without exception had eyebrows, some
darker and more decidedly marked than the others, but all had
eyebrows more or less plainly visible.” Black caterpillars occasion-
ally appear amongst those of the common kind, but in so N^ariable a
manner, that, according to M. Robinet, the same race will one year
e.^clusively produce white caterpillars, and the next year many
black ones ; nevertheless, I have been informed by M. A. Bossi of
Geneva, that, if these black caterpillars are separately bred from,
they reproduce the same colour ; but the cocoons and moths reared
from them do not present any difference.
The caterpillar in Europe ordinarily moults four times before
passing into the cocoon stage ; but there are races “ a trois mues,”
and the Trevoltini race likewise moults only thrice. It might have
been thought that so important a physiological difference would
not have arisen under domestication; but M. Robinet states that,
on the one hand, ordinary caterpillars occasionally spin their
cocoons after only three moults, and, on the other hand, “ presquo
toutes les races a trois nines, que nous avons experimentees, ont
fait quatre mues a la seconde ou a la troisieme annee, ce qui
semble prouver qu’il a suffi de les placer dans des conditions
favorables pour leur rendre une faculte qu’elles avaient perdue sous
des influences moins favorables.”
Cocoons. — The caterpillar in changing into the cocoon loses about
50 per cent, of its weight; but the amount of loss differs in different
breeds, and this is of importance to the cultivator. The cocoon in
the different races presents characteristic differences; being largo
or small ; — nearly spherical with no constriction, as in the Race de
Loriol, or cylindrical, with either a deep or slight constriction in the
middle; with the two ends, or with one end alone, more or less
pointed. The silk varies in fineness and quality, and in being
nearly white, but of two tints, or yellow. Generally the colour of
the silk is not strictly inherited : but in the chapter on Selection I
shall give a curious account how, in the course of sixty-five genera-
tions, the number of yellow cocoons in one breed has been reduced
in France from one hundred to thirty-five in the thousand.
According to Robinet, the white race, called Sina, by careful
selection during the last seventy-five years, “ est arrivee a un tel
etat de purete, qu’on ne voit pas un seul cocon jaune dans des
millions de cocons blancs.” Cocoons are sometimes formed, as is
well known, entirely destitute of silk, which yet produce moths ;
unfortunately Mrs. Whitby was prevented by an accident from
ascertaining whether this character would prove hereditary.
Adult stage. — I can find no account of any constant difference in
the moths of the most distinct races. Mrs. AVhitby assured roe
tliat there was none in the several kinds bred by her; and I have
Robinet, ibid,, p. 317
” Robinet, ibid., pp. 306-317,
320
SILK-MOTHS.
Chap. VIIL
received a similar statement from the eminent naturalist, ]\L de
Quatrefages. Captain Hutton also says'^*^ that the moths of all
kinds vary much in colour, but in nearly the same inconstant
manner. Considering how much the cocoons in the several races
differ, this fact is of interest, and may probably be accounted for
on the same principle as the fluctuating variability of colour in the
caterpillar, namely, that there has been no motive for selecting and
perpetuating any particular variation.
The males of the wild Bombycidae fly swiftly in the day-time
and evening, but the females are usually very sluggish and
inactive.” In several moths of this family the females have
abortive wings, but no instance is known of the males being
incapable of flight, for in this case the species could hardly have
been perpetuated. In the silk-moth both sexes have imperfect,
crumpled wings, and are incapable of flight ; but still there is a
trace of the characteristic difference in the two sexes ; for though,
on comparing a number of males and females, I could detect no
difference in the development of their wings, yet I was assured by
Mrs. Whitby that the males of the moths bred by her used their
wings more than the females, and could flutter downwards, though
never upwards. She also states that, hen the females first
emerge from the cocoon, their wings are less expanded than those
of the male. The degree of imperfection, however, in the wings
varies much in different races and under different circumstances.
M. Quatrefages"^^ says that he has seen a number of moths with
their wings reduced to a third, fourth, or tenth part of their normal
dimensions, and even to mere short straight stumps': ''il me semble
qu’il y a la un veritable arret de developpement partiel.” On the
other hand, he describes the female moths of the Andre Jean breed
as having “ leurs ailes larges et etalees. Un seul presente quelques
courbures irregulieres et des plis anormaux.” As moths and butter-
flies of all kinds reared from wild caterpillars under confinement
often have crippled wings, the same cause, whatever it may be, has
probably acted on silk-moths, but the disuse of their wings during
so many generations has, it may be suspected, likewise come into
play.
The moths of many breeds fail to glue their eggs to the surface
on which they are laid,’’'* but this proceeds, according to Capt.
Hutton,*^° merely from the glands of the ovipositor being weakened.
As with other long- domesticated animals, the instincts of the
silk-moth have suffered. The caterpillars, when placed on a mul-
berry-tree, often commit the strange mistake of devouring the
base of the leaf on which they are feeding, and consequently fall
’’6 ‘ Transact. Ent. Soc.,’ ut supra,
p. 317.
’’’ Stephen’s Illustrations, ‘ Haus-
tellata,’ vol. ii. p. 35. See also Capt.
Hutton, ‘ Transact. Ent. Soc.,’ ibid.,
p. 152.
’’8 ‘ Etudes sur les Maladies du Ver
a Soie,’ 1859, pp. 304, 209.
’■9 Quatrefages, ‘ Etudes,’ &c., p.
214.
80 ‘ Transact. Ent. Soc.,’ ut supra,
p. 151.
Chap. VIII.
THEIK DIFFERENCES.
821
clown ; but they are capable, according to M. Robiriet,®^ of again
crawling up the trunk. Even this capacity sometimes fails, for
M. Martins placed some caterpillars on a tree, and those which
tell were not able to remount and perished of hunger ; they were
even incapable of passing from leaf to leaf.
Some of the modifications which the silk moth has undergone
stand in coi-relation with one another. Thus, the eggs of the moths
which produce wdiite cocoons and of those which produce yellow
cocoons differ slightly in tint. The abdominal feet, also, of the
cateri^illars which yield white cocoons are always white, whilst
those which give yellow cocoons are invariably yellow.®^ We have
seen that the caterpillars with dark tiger-like stripes produce
moths which are more darkly shaded than other moths. It seems
well established that in France the caterpillars of the races which
produce white silk, and certain black caterpillars, have resisted,
better than other races, the disease which has recently devastated
the silk-districts. Lastly, the races differ constitutionally, for some
do not succeed so well under a temperate climate as others ; and a
damp soil does not equally injure all the races.^^
From these various facts we learn that silk-moths, like the
higher animals, vary greatly under long-continued domes-
tication. We learn also the more important fact that varia-
tions may occur at various periods of life, and be inherited at
a corresponding period. And finally we see that insects are
amenable to the great principle of Selection.
81 ‘ Manuel de Pflducateur,’ &c., 12, 209, 214.
p. 26. Kobinet, ‘ Manuel,’ &c., p. 303,
82 Godron, ‘ De I’Espeee,’ p. 462. .85 Kobinet, ibid., p. 15.
83 Quatrefages, ‘ Etudes,’ &c,, pp.
22
322
CULTIVATED PLANTS.
Chap. IX.
CHAPTER IX.
CULTIVATED PLANTS : CEREAL AND CULINARY PLANTS.
PK]|]LIMINAEY HEMAEKS on the number and parentage oh
CULTIVATED PLANTS — FIRST STEPS IN CULTIVATION — GEOGRAPHICAL
DISTRIBU'IION OF CULTIVA'l'ED PLANTS.
CEREALIA. — DOUBTS ON the number of species. wheat; varieties
OP — INDIVIDUAL VARIABILITY — CHANGED HABITS — SEl.ECTION — ANCIENT
HISrORY OF THE VARIETIES. MAIZE: GREAT VARIATION (IF — DIRECT
ACTION OP CLIMATE ON.
CUUNARY PLAN'l'S. — cabbages: varieties of, in foliage and
STEMS, BUT NOT IN OTHEit PARTS — PARENTAGE OF— OTHER SPECIES OF
BRASSICA. PI AS .' AiMOUNT OP DIFFEBENCE IN THE SEVERAL KINDS,
CHIEFLY .IN THE PODS AND SEED — SOME VARIETIES CONSTANT, SOME
HIGHLY variable — DO NOT INTERCROSS. BE\NS. POTATOES :
NUMEROUS VARIETIES OF — DIFFERING LITTLE, EXCEPT IN THE TUBERS —
CHARACTERS INHERITED.
I SHALL not enter into so much detail on the variability of
cultivated plants, as in the case of domesticated animals.
The subject is involved in much difficulty. Botanists have
generally neglected cultivated varieties, as beneath their
notice. In several cases the wild prototype is unknown or
doubtfully known ; and in other cases it is hardly possible to
distinguish between escaped seedlings and truly wild plants,
so that there is no safe standard of comparison by which to
judge of an}" supposed amount of change. Not a few bota-
nists believe that several of our anciently cultivated plants
have become so profoundly modified that it is not possible
now to recognise their aboriginal parent-forms. Equally
perplexing are the doubts whether some of them are de-
scended from one species, or from several inextricably com-
mingled by crossing and variation. Variations often pass
into, and cannot be distinguished from, monstrosities ; and
monstrosities are of little significance for our purpose. Many
varieties are propagated solely by grafts, buds, layers, bulbs,
c't;c., and frequently it is not known how far their peculiarities
can be transmitted by seminal generation. Nevertheless.
Chap. IX.
PRELIMINAEY REMARKS
325
some facts of value can be gleaned : and other facts will
hereafter be incidentally given. One chief object in the
two following chapters is to show how many characters in
our cultivated plants have become variable.
Before entering on details a few general remarks on the
origin of cultivated plants may be introduced. M. Alph. De
Candolle^ in an admirable discussion on this subject, in which
he displays a wonderful amount of knowledge, gives a list of
157 of the most useful cultivated plants. Of these he
believes that 85 are almost certainly known in their wild
state ; but on this head other competent judges^ entertain
great doubts. Of 40 of them, the origin is admitted by M.
De Candolle to be doubtful, either from a certain amount of
dissimilarity which they present when compared with their
nearest allies in a'Vild state, or from the probability of the
latter not being truly wild plants, but seedlings escaped
from culture. Of tlie entire 157, 32 alone are ranked by
M. De Candolle as quite unknown in .their aboriginal con-
dition. But it should be observed that he does not include
in his list several plants which present ill-defined characters,
namely, the various forms of pumpkins, millet, sorghum,
kidney-bean, dolichos, capsicum, and indigo. Nor does he
include flowers ; and several of the more anciently cultivated
flowers, such as certain roses, the common Imperial lily, the
tuberose, and even the lilac, are said^ not to be known in the
wild state.
From the relative numbers above given, and from other
arguments of much weight, M. De Candolle concludes that
plants have rarely been so much modified by culture that
they cannot be identified with their wild prototypes. But
on this view, considering that savages probably would not
have- chosen rare plants for cultivation, that useful plants are
generally conspicuous, and that they could not have been
the inhabitants of deserts or of remote and recently discovered
* ‘Geogvaphie botanique raisonnee,’
1855, pp. 810 to 991.
^ Review by Mr. Bentham in ‘ Hort.
Journal,’ vol. ix. 1855, p. 133, entitled,
‘ Historical Notes on cultivated
Plants,’ by Dr. A. Pargioni-Tozzetti.
See also ‘Edinburgh Review,’ 1866,
p. 510.
® ‘ Hist. Notes,’ as above, by Tar-
gioni-Tozzetti.
324
CULTIVATED PLANTS.
Chap IX.
islands, it appears strange to me that so many of onr culti-
vated plants should he still unknown or only doubtfully
known in the wild state. If, on the other hand, many of
tliese plants have been profoundly modified by culture, the
diffeulty disappears. The difficulty would also bo removed
if they have been exterminated during the progress of civili-
sation ; but M. De Candolle has shown that this probably has
seldom oceurred. As soon as a plant was eultivated in any
country, the half-civilised inhabitants would no longer have
need to search the whole surface of the land for it, and thus
lead to its extirpation ; and even if this did occur during a
famine, dormant seeds would be left in the ground. In
tropical countries the wild luxuriance of nature, as was long
ago remarked by Humboldt, ovei powers the feeble efforts of
man. In anciently civilised temperate countries, where the
whole face of the land has been greatly changed, it can hardly
be doubted that some plants have become extinct ; never-
theless De Candolle has shown that all the plants historically
known to have been first cultivated in Europe still exist here
in the wild state.
MM. l.oiseleur-Deslongchamps and De CandoUe have re-
marked that our cultivated plants, more especially the cereals,
must originally have existed in nearly their present state ; for
otherwise they would not have been noticed and valued as
objects of food. But these authors apparently have not con-
sidered the many accounts given by travellers of the wretched
food collected by savages. I have read an account of the
savages of Australia cooking, during a dearth, many vegetables
in various ways, in the hopes of rendering them innocuous and
more nutritious. Dr. Hooker found the half-starved in-
habitants of a village in Sikhim suffering greatly from
having eaten arum-roots,^ which they had pounded and left
for several days, to ferment, so as partially to destroy their
poisonous nature ; and he adds that they cooked and ate many
■* ‘ Considerations sur les Cereales,’ des espfeces offrant a I’origjne meme
1342, p. 87. ‘Geograjihie But.,’ 1855, iin avantage incontestable.”
p. 930. “ Plus on suppose I’agvicul- ^ Dr. Hooker has given me this
ture ancienne et remontant a une information. See, also, his ‘ Himalayan
^poque d’ignorance, plus il est probable Journals,’ 1854, vol. ii. p 49.
que les cultivateurs avaient choisi
Chap. IX.
PRELIMINARY REMARKS.
325
otlier deleterious plants. Sir Andrew Smith informs me that
in South Africa a large number of fruits and succulent leaves,
and especially roots, are used in times of scarcity. Tlie
natis^es, indeed, know the properties of a long catalogue of
plants, some having been found during famines to be eatable,
others injurious to health, or even destructive to life. He
mot a party of Baquanas who, having been expelled by the
conquering Zulus, had lived for years on any roots or leaves
which alforded some little nutriment and distended their
stomachs, so as to relieve the pangs of hunger. They looked
like walking skeletons, and suffered fearfully from con-
stipation. Sir Andrew Smith also informs me that on such
occasions the natives observe as a guide for themselves, what
the wild animals, especially baboons and monlce3's, eat.
From innumerable experiments made through dire ne-
cessity by the savages of every land, with the results handed
down by tradition, the nutritious, stimulating, and medicinal
properties of the most unpromising plants Avere probably
first discoA’ered. It appears, for instance, at first an in-
explicable fact that untutored man, in three distant quarters
of the world, should haAm discovered, amongst a host of
native plants, tliat the leaves of the tea-plant and niattee,
and the berries of the coffee, all included a stimulating and
nutritious essence, now knoAvn to be chemically the same.
We can also see that savages suffering from severe con-
stipation would naturally observe whether any of the roots
which they deAmured acted as aperients. We probably owe
our knowledge of the uses of almost all plants to man
liaA'ing originally existed in a barbarous state, and having
been often compelled by severe want to try as food almost
eA^ery thing which he could chew and swalloAV.
From what we know of the habits of savages in many
quarters of the world, there is no reason to suppose that our
cereal plants originally existed in their present state so
A’^alnable to man. Let us look to one continent alone, namely,
Africa : Barfh® states that the slaves over a large part of the
® ‘Travels in Central Africa,’ Eng. ii. p[j. 29, 265, 270 Livingstone’s
Iranslat. vol. i. pp. 529 and 390; voi. ‘Travels,’ p. 551.
326
CULTIVATED PLANTS.
Chap. IX.
oeiitidl region regularly collect the seeds of a wild grass, the
Penniseturib disticlmm ; in another district he saw women
collecting the seeds of a Poa by swinging a sort of basket
through the rieh meadow-land. Near T^ete, Livingstone
observed the natives collecting the seeds of a wild grass, and
farther south, as Andersson informs me, the natives largely
use the seed of a grass of about the size of canary-seed, which
they boil in water. They eat also the roots of certain reeds,
and every one has read of the Bushmen prowling about and
digging up with a fire-hardened stake various roots. Similar
fa,cts with respect to the collection of seeds of wild grasses in
other parts of the world eould be given. ^
Accustomed as we are to our excellent vegetables and
luscious fruits, we can hardly persuade ourselves that the
stringy roots of the wild carrot and parsnip, or the little
shoots of the wild asparagus, or crabs, sloes, &c., should ever
have been valued ; yet, from what we know of the habits of
Australian and South African savages, we need feel no doubt
on this head. The inhabitants of Switzerland during the
Stone period largely colleeted wild crabs, sloes, bullaces, hips
of roses, elderberries, beechmast, and other wild berries and
fruit. ^ Jemmy Button, a Fuegian on board the Beagle,
remarked to me that the poor and acid black-currants of
J'ierra del Fuego were too sweet for his taste.
The savage inhabitants of each land, having found out by
many and hard trials what plants were useful, or could be ,
rendered useful by various cooking processes, would after a
time take the first step in cultivation by planting them near
their usual abodes. Livingstone^ states that the savage
Batokas- sometimes left wild fruit-trees standing in their
gardens, and occasionally even planted them, “ a practice
’’ For instance, in both North and
South America. Mr. Edgeworth
(‘Journal Proc. Linn. Soc.,’ vol vi.
Bot., 1862, p. 181) states that in the
deserts of the Punjab poor women
sweep up, “ by a whisk into straw
baskets,” the seeds of four genera of
grasses, namely, of Agrostis, Panicum,
Cenchrus, and Pennisetum, as well as
the seeds of four other genera beloug-
ing to distinct families.
® Prof. 0. Heor, ‘Die Pflanzen der
Pfahlbauten, 1866, aus dem Neujahr.
Naturforsch. Gesellschaft,’ 1866; ami
Dr. H. Christ, in Riitimeyer’s ‘ Die
Fauna der Pfahlbauten,’ 1861, s. 226.
® ‘ Travels,’ ]>. 565. Du Chaillu,
‘Adventures in Equatorial Africu,’
1861, p. 445.
Chap. IX.
PRELIMINARY REMARKS.
327
seen nowhere else amongst the natives.” But Du Chaillu
saw a palm and some other wild fruit-trees which had been
planted; and these trees were considered private property.
The next step in cultivation, and this would require but little
forethought, would be to sow the seeds of useful plants ;
and as the soil near the hovels of the natives^® would often 1)g
in some degree manured, improved varieties would sooner or
later arise.' Or a wild and unusually good variety of a native
plant might attract the attention of some wise old savage ;
and he would transplant it, or sow its seed. 'That superior
varieties of wild fruit-trees occasionally are found is certain,
as in the case of the American species of hawthorns, plums,
cherries, grapes, and hickories, specified by Professor Asa
Gray.^^ Downing also refers to certain wild varieties of the
hickory, as being “ of much larger size and finer flavour than
the ‘common species.” I have referred to American fruit-trees,
because we are not in this case troubled with doubts whether
or not the varieties are seedlings which have escaped from
cultivation. Transplanting any superior variety, or sowing
its seeds, hardly implies more forethought than might be
expected at an early and rude period of civilisation. Even
the Australian barbarians “ have a law that no plant bearing
seeds is to be dug up after it has flowered and Sir G Grrey^'^
never saw this law, evidently framed for the preservation ol
the plant, violated. We see the same spirit in the super-
stitious belief of the Euegians, that killing water-fowl whilst
very young will be followed by “ much rain, snow, blow
inuchA I may add, as showing forethought in the lowest
barbarians, that the Euegians when they find a stranded
whale bury large portions in the sand, and during the often-
recurrent famines travel from great distances for the remnants
of the half-putrid mass.
It has often been remarked that we do not owe a single
In Tierra del Fuego the spot 1845, p. 261.
waere wigwams had formerly stood ‘ Journals of Expeditions in Avis-
could be distinguished at a great . tralia,’ 1841, vol. ii. p. 292. '
distance by the bright green tint of Darwin’s ‘ Journal of Researches,’
the native vegetation. 1845, p. 215.
" ‘American Acad, of Arts and *■* De Candolle has tabulated the
Sciences,’ April 10th, 1860, p. 413, facts in the most interesting manner
Downing, ‘The Fruits of America,’ in his ‘ Geographic Bot.,’ p. 986
328
CULTIVATED PLANTS.
CuAr. IX.
useful plant to Australia or the Cape of Good Hope, — countries
abounding to an unparalleled degree with endemic species. —
or to New Zealand, or to America south of the Plata ; and,,
according to some authors, not to America northward of
Mexico. I do not believe that any edible or valuable plant,
except the canary grass, has been derived from an oceanic or
uninhabited island. If nearly all our useful plants, natives
of Europe, Asia, and South America, had originally existed
in their present condition, the complete absence of similarly
useful plants in the great countries just named would be indeed
a surprising fact. But if these plants have been so greatly
moditied and improved by culture as no longer closely to
resemble any natural species, we can understand why the
above named countries have given us no useful plants, for
they were either inhabited by men who did not cultivate the
ground at all, as in Australia and the Cape of Good Hope, or
who cultivated it very imperfectly, as in some parts of
America. These countries do yield plants which are useful
to savage man ; and Dr. Hooker enumerates no less than
107 such species in Australia alone; but these plants have
not been improved, and consequently cannot compete with
those which have been cultivated and improved during
thousands of years in the civilised world.
The case of New Zealand, to which fine island we as yet
owe no widely cultivated plant, may seem opposed to this
view; for, when first discovered, the natives cultivated
several plants ; but all inquirers believe, in accordance with
the traditions of the natives, tliat the early Polynesian
colonists brought with them seeds and roots, as well as the
dog, which had been wisely preserved during their long
voyage. The I Polynesians are so frequently lost on the ocean
that this degree of prudence would occur to any wandering
party: hence the early colonists of New Zealand, like the
later European colonists, would not have had any strong
inducement to cultivate the aboriginal plants. According to
Do Candolle we owe thirty-three useful plants to Mexico,
Peru, and Chile; nor is this surprising whep we remember
the civilized state of the inhabitants, as shown by the fact of
** ‘ FJora of Australia,’ Introduction, p. c^.
Chap. IX.
PRELIMINAKY REMARKS.
329
their having practised artificial irrigation and made tunnels
through hard rocks without the use of iron or gunpowder,
and who, as we shall see in a future chapter, fully recognised,
as far as animals were concerned, and therefore probably in
the case of plants, the important principle of selection. AVe
owe some plants- to Brazil ; and the early voyagers, namely,
Vespucius and Cabral, describe the country as thickl}^ peojoled
and cultivated. In Korth America the natives cultivated
maize, pumpkins, gourds, beans, and peas, “ all different from
ours,” and tobacco ; and we are hardly justified in assuming
that none of our present plants are descended from these
North American forms. Had North America been ci\'ilized
for as long a period, and as thickly peopled, as Asia or hurope,
it is probable that the native vines, walnuts, mulberries,
crabs, and plums, would have given rise, after a long course
of cultivation, to a multitude of vaiieties, some extremely
difterent from their parent-stocks ; and escaped seedlings
would have caused in the New, as in tlie OW World, niucli
perplexity with respect to their specific distinctness and
parentage.^
Cereal>a. — I will now enter on details. The cereals cultivated in
Europe consist of four genera — wheat, rye, barley, and oats. Of
wheat the best modern authorities make four or five, or even
seven distinct species; of rye, one; of barley,, three ; and of oats,
two, three, or four species. So that altogether our cereals are
ranked by different authors under from ten to fifteen distinct
species. These have given rise to a multitude of varieties. It is
a remarkable fact that botanists are not universally agreed on the
aboriginal parent-form of any one cereal plant. Eor instance, a
For Canada, see J. Cartier’s
Voyage in 1534; for Florida, see
IS'arvaez and Ferdinand de Soto’s
Voyages. As 1 have consulted these
and other old Voyages in more than
one general collection of Voyages, I
do not give precise reterences to the
pages. See also, for several references,
Asa Gray, in the ‘American Journal
of Science,’ vol. xxiv. Nov. 1857, p.
441. For the traditions of the natives
of New Zealand, see Crawfurd’s
‘Grammar and Diet, of the Malay
Language,’ 1852, p. cclx.
See, for example, Mr. Hewett C.
Watson’s remarhs on our wild plums
and cherries and crabs: ‘Cybele
Britannica,’ vol. i. pp. 330, 334, Lc.
Van Mons (in his ‘ Arbres Fruitiers,’
1835, tom. i. p. 444) declares that he
has found the types of all our culti-
vated varieties in wild seedlings, but
then he looks on these seedlings as so
many aboriginal stocks.
18 See A. De Candolle, ‘ Geograph.
Bot.,’ 1855, p. 928 et seq. Godroi ,
‘ De rEsj)ece,’ 1859, tom. ii. p. 70 ; and
Metzger, ‘Die Getreidearten,’&c., 1841,
330
CEREAL TLANTS.
Chap. IX.
high aiTtliority writes in 1855,’® '‘We ourselves liave no hesitation
in stating our conviction, as the result of all the most reliable
evidence, that none of these Cerealia exist, or have existed, truly
wild in their present state, but that all are cultivated varieties
of species now growing in great abundance in S. Europe or W. Asia.”
Oil the other hand, Alpli. De Candolle^® has adduced abundant
evidence that common wheat {Tnticum vulgare) has been found
wild in various parts of Asia, where it is not likely to have escaped
from cultivation : and there is some force in M. Godron’s remark,
that, supposing these plants to be escaped seedlings,^’ as they have
propagated themselves in a wild state for several generations, their
continued resemblance to cultivated when,t renders it probable that
the latter has retained its aboriginal character. But the strong
tendency to inheritance, which most of the varieties of wheat evince,
as we shall presently see, is here greatly undervalued. Much
weight must also be attributed to a remark by Professor Hilde-
brand,^^ that when the seeds or fruit of cultivated plants possess
qualities disadvantageous to them as a means of distribution, we may
feel almost sure that they no longer retain their aboriginal condition.
On the other hand, M. l)e Candolle insists strongly on the frequent
occurrence in the Austrian dominions of rye and of one kind of oats
in an apparently wild condition. With the exception of these two
cases, which however are rather doubtful, and with the exception of
two forms of wheat and one of barley, which he believes to have been
found truly wild, M. De Candolle does not seem fully satisfied with
the other reported discoveries of the parent-forms of our other
cereals. With respect to oats, according to Mr. Buckmann,^^ the
wild English Avt'na fatua can be converted by a few years of careful
cultivation and selection into forms almost identical with two, very
distinct cultivated • races. The whole subject of the origin and
specific distinctness of the various cereal plants is a most difficult
one ; but we shall perhaps be able to judge a little better after con-
sidering the amount of variation which wheat has undergone.
Metzger describes seven species of wheat, Godron refers to five,
Mr. Bentham, in his review,
entitled ‘ Hist. Notes on cultivated
Plants,’ by Dr. A. Targioni-Tozzetti,
in ‘ Journal of Hort. Soc.,’ vol. ix.
(1855), p. 133. He informs me that
he still retains the same opinion.
‘ Geograph. Bot.,’ p. 928. The
whole subject is discussed with admir-
able fulness and knowledge.
Godron, ‘ De I’Espfece,’ tom. ii. p.
72. A few years ago the excellent,
though misinterpreted, observations
of M. Fabre led many persons to
believe that wheat was a moditied
descendant of Algilops ; but M. Godron!
(tom. i. p. 165) has shown by careful
experiments that the first step in the
series, viz. JEgilops triticoides, is a
hybrid between wheat and AJ. ovata.
The frequency with which these
hybrids spontaneously arise, and the
gradual manner in which the
triticoides becomes converted into true
wheat, alone leave any doubt with
respect to M. Godron’s coned usions.
‘ Die Verbreituhgsmittei der
Pflanzen, 1873, p. 129. '
Report to British Association foi
1857, p. 207.
Chap. IX.
WHEAT.
331
and De Candolle to only four. It is not improbable that, besides
the kinds known in Europe, other strongly characterised forms exist
in the more distant parts of the world; for Loiseleur-Deslong-
champs‘^‘‘ speaks of three new species or varieties, sent to Euiope
in 18‘22 from Chinese Mongolia, which he considers as being there
indigenous. Moorcroft also speaks of llasora wheat in Ladakh
as very peculiar. If those botanists are right who believe that at
least seven species of wheat originally existed, then the amount
of variation in any important character which wheat has undergone
under cultivation has been slight; but if only four or a lesser
number of species originally existed, then it is evident that varieties
have arisen so strongly marked, that they have been considered by
capable judges as specifically distinct. But the impossibility of
deciding which forms ought to be ranked as species and which as
varieties, makes it useless to specify in detail the differences between
the various kinds of wheat. Speaking generally, the organs of
vegetation differ little but some kinds grow close and upright,
whilst others spread and trail along the ground. The straw differs
in being more or less hollow, and in quality. The ears differ in
colour and in shape, being quadrangular, compressed, or nearly
cylindrical ; and the florets differ in their approximation to each
other, in their pubescence, and in being more or less elongated.
The presence or absence of barbs is a conspicuous difference, and in
certain Graraineae serves even as a generic character ; although,
as remarked by Godron,^® the presence of barbs is variable in certain
wild grasses, and especially in those such as Bromus secalinus and
Lolium temulentum, which habitually grow mingled with our cereal
crops, and which have thus unintentionally been exposed to culture.
The grains differ in size, weight, and colour ; in being more or less
downy at one end, in being smooth or wrinkled, in being either
nearly globular, oval, or elongated; and finally in internal texture,
being tender or hard, or even almost horny, and in the proportion
of gluten which they contain.
Nearly all the races or species of wheat vary, as Godron ^ has
remarked, in an exactly parallel manner, — in the seed being downy
or glabrous, and in colour, — and in the florets being barbed or
not barbed, &c. Those who believe that all the kinds are descended
from a single wild species may account for this parallel variation
by the inheritance of a similar constitution, and a consequent
tendency to vary in the same manner; and those who believe
in the general theory of descent with modification may extend this
‘ Considerations sur les Cereales,’
1842-43, p. 29.
‘Travels in the Himalayan Pro- •
Vinces,’ &c., 1841, vol. i. p. 224.
Col. J. Le Couteur on the
' Varieties of Wheat,’ pp. 23, 79.
Loiseleur-Deslongchamps, ‘Con-
sid. 6ur les Cereales,’ p. 11.
See an excellent review in
Hooker’s ‘Journ. of Botany,’ vol. viii
p. 82, note
‘ ‘ De I’Espece, tom. ii. p. 73.
Ibid., tom. ii. p. 75.
CEREAL PLANTS.
Chap. IX.
33:^
view to the several species of wheat, if such ever existed in a state
of nature.
Although few of the varieties of wheat present any conspicuous
difference, their number is great. Dalbret cultivated during thirty
years from 150 to 160 kinds, and excepting in the quality of the
grain they all kept true; Colonel Le Couteur possessed upwards ol
150, and Philippar 322 varieties.^’ As wheat is an annual, we thus
see how strictly many trifling differences in character are inherited
tlirougli many generations. Colonel Le Couteur insists strongly on
this same fact. In his persevering and successful attempts to raise
new varieties, he found that there was only one “ secure mode to
“ ensure the growth of pure sorts, namely, to grow them from single
grains or from single cars, and to follow up the plan by afterwards
sowing only the produce of the most productive so as to form a
“ stock.” But Major Hallett has gone much farther, and by the
continued selection of plants from the grains of the same ear,
during successive generations, has made his ‘ Pedigree in Wheat ’
(and other cereals) now famous in many quarters of the world.
The great amount of variability in the plants of the same
variety is another interesting point, which would never have
been detected except by an eye long practised to the work;
thus Colonel Le Couteur relates that in a field of his own
wheat, which he considered at least as pure as that of any of his
neighbours. Professor La Gasca found twenty-three sorts; and
Professor Henslow has observed similar facts. Besides such in-
dividual variations, forms sufficiently ’^ell marked to be valued and
to become widely cultivated sometimes suddenly appear: thus
Mr. Shirreff has had the good fortune to raise in his lifetime seven
new varieties, which are now extensively grown in many parts of
Britain.^^
As in the case of many other plants, some varieties, both old and
new, are far more constant in character than others. Colonel Lc
Couteur was forced to reject some of his new sub-varieties, which
he suspected had been produced from a cross, as incorrigibly
sportive. On the other hand Major Hallett has shown how wo i ;der-
fully constant some varieties are, although not ancient ones, and al-
though cultivated in various countries. With respect to the tendency
to vary, Metzger gives from his own experience some interesting
facts ; he describes three Spanish sub-varieties, more especially one
For Dalbret and Philippar, see
Loiselenr-Deslongchamps, ‘ Consid. sur
les Cer stilus,’ pp. 45, 70. Le Couteur
on Wheat, pp. 6, 14-17.
See his Essay on ‘ Pedigree in
VVheat,’ 1862 ; also paper read before
the British Association, 1869, and
other pulilications.
‘ \'aneties of Wheat,’ Introduc-
Uon, p. vi. Marshall, in his ‘ Rural
Economy of Yorkshire,’ vol. ii. p. 9,
remarks that “ in every field of corn
there is as much variety as in a herd
of cattle.”
‘ Gardener’s Chron.’ and ‘ Agri-
culc. Gazette,’ 1862, p. 963.
‘Gardener’s Chron.’ Nov. 1868
p. 1199.
‘ Getreidcarten,’ 1841^ s. 06, 91
92, 116, 117.
Chap. IX.
WHEAT.
333
known to be constant in Spain, which in Germany assnmnd their
proper character only during hot summers ; another variety kept
true only in good land, but after having been cultivated for twenty-
five years became more constant. He mentions two other sub-
varieties which were at first inconstant, but subsequently becam^e,
apparently without any selection, accustomed to their new homes,
and retained their proper character. These facts show what small
changes in the conditions of life cause variability, and they further
show that a variety may become habituated to new conditions.
One is at first inclined to conclude with Loiseleur-Deslongchamps,
that wheat cultivated in the same country is exposed to remarkably
uniform conditions; but manures differ, seed is taken from one
soil to another, and, what is far more important, the plants are
exposed as little as possible to struggle witli other plants, and are
thus enabled to exist under diversified conditions. In a state of
hature each plant is confined to that particular station and kind
of nutriment which it can seize from the other plants by which it
is surrounded.
Wheat quickly assumes new habits of life. The summer and
winter kinds were classed by Linnaeus as distinct species ; but
M. Monnier^^ has proved that the difference between them is only
temporary. He sowed winter-wheat in spring, and out of one
hundred plants four alone produced ripe seeds; these were sown
and resown, and in three years plants were reared which ripened
all their seed. Conversely, nearly all the plants raised from
summer- wheat, which was sown in autumn, perished from frost ;
but a few were saved and produced seed, and in three years this
summer- variety was c< mverted into a winter- variety. Hence it is not
surprising that wheat soon becomes to a certain extent acclimatised,
and that seed brought from distant countries and sown in Europe
vegetates at first, or even for a considerable period, differently
from our European varieties= In Canada the first sellers, accord-
ing to Kalm,^® found their winters too severe for winter-wheat
brought from France, and their summers often too short for sum-
mer-wheat ; and they thought that their country was useless for
corn crops until they procured summer- wheat from the northern
parts of Europe, which succeeded well. It is notorious that the
proportion of gluten differs much under different climates. The
weight of the grain is also quickly affected by climate : Loiseleur-
Deslongchamps sowed near Paris 54 varieties, obtained fi-om the
South of France and from the Black Sea, and 52 of these yielded
seed from 10 to 40 per cent, heavier than the parent-seed. He then
Quoted by Godron, ‘ De I’Espfece,’
vol. ii. p. 74, So it is, according to
Metzger (‘ Getreidearten,’ s. 18), with
summer and winter barley,
Loiseleur-Deslongchamps, ‘Cere-
ales,’ part ii. p. 224. Le Couteur, p.
70. Many othef acciuuts could be
added.
‘Travels in North America,’
1753-1761, Eng. translat., vol, iii. p.
165.
‘ Cereal es,’ part ii. pp. 170-183
334
CEREAL PLANTS.
Chap. IX.
Eoiit these heavier grains back to the South of Franco, but thero
they immediately yielded lighter seed.
All those who have closely attended to the subject insist on the
close adaptation of numerous varieties of wheat to various soils and
climates even within the same country; thus Colonel Le Couteur'*-
says, ‘Mt is the suitableness of each sort to each soil that will
enable the farmer to pay his rent by sowing one variety, where he
would be unable to do so by attempting to grow another of a
seemingly better sort." This may be in part due to each kind
becoming habituated to its conditions of life, as Metzger has shown
certainly occurs, but it is probably in main part due to innate
differences between the several varieties.
Much has been written on the deterioration of wheat ; that the
quality of the flour, size of grain, time of flowering, and hardness,
may be modified by climate and soil, seems nearly certain; but
that the whole body of any one sub-variety ever becomes changed
into another and distinct sub- variety, there is no reason to believe.
What apparently does take place, according to Le Couteur,^^ is, that
some one sub-variety out of the many which may always be detected
in the same field is more prolific than the others, and gradually
supplants the variety which was first sown.
With respect to the natural crossing of distinct varieties the
evidence is conflicting, but preponderates against its frequent occur-
rence. Many authors maintain that impregnation takes place in
the closed flower, but I am sure from my own observation that this
is not the case, at least with those varieties to which I have attended.
But as I shall have to discuss this subject in another work, it may
be here passed over.
In conclusion, all authors admit that numerous varieties of
wheat have arisen; but their differences are unimportant,
unless, indeed, some of the so-called species are ranked as
varieties. Those who believe that from four to seven wild
species of Triticum originally existed in nearly the same con-
dition as at present, rest their belief chiefly on the great
antiquity of the several forms. It is an important fact,
which we have recently learnt from the admirable researches
of Heer,^^ that the inhabitants of Switzerland, even so early
‘On the Varieties of Wheat,’
Introduct., p. vii. See Marshall,
‘ Rural Econ. of Yorkshire,’ vol. ii. p.
9. With respect to similar cases of
adaptation in the varieties of oats, see
some interesting papers in the ‘ Gar-
den )i ’s Chron. and Agricult. Gazette,’
1850, pp. 204, 219.
‘ On the Varieties of Wheat,’ p.
59. Mr. Shirreff, and a higher autho-
rity cannot be given (‘ Gard. Chron.
and Agricult. Gazette,’ 1862, p.
963), says, “I have never seen grain
which has either been improved or
degenerated by cultivation, so as to
convey the change to the succeeding
crop.
■‘3 Alph. De Candolle, ‘ Geograph.
Bot.,’ p. 930.
‘ Pdanzen der Pfahlbautcn, ’ 1866.
Chap. IX.
WHEAT.
335
as the Neolithic period, cultivated no less than ten cereal
plants, namely, five kinds of wheat, of which at least four are
commonly looked at as distinct species, three kinds of barley,
a panicum, and a setaria. If it could be shoAvn that at the
earliest dawn of agriculture five kinds of wheat and three of
barley had been cultivated, we should of course be compelled
to look at these forms as distinct species. But, as Heer has
remarked, agriculture even at the Neolithic period, had already
made considerable progress ; for, besides the cereals, peas,
poppies, flax, and apparently apples, were cultivated. It may
also be inferred, from one variety of wheat being the so called
Egyptian, and/rom what is known of the native country of
the panicum and setaria, as well as from the nature of the
weeds which then grew* mingled with the crops, that the lake-
inhabitants either still kept up commercial intercourse with
some southern people or had originally proceeded as colonists
from the South.
Loiseleur-Deslongchamps has argued that, if our cereal
plants have been greatly modified by cultivation, the weeds
which habitually grow mingled with them would have been
e lually modified. But this argument shows how completely
the principle of selection has been overlooked. That such
weeds have not varied, or at least do not vary now in any
extreme degree, is the opinion of Mr. H. C. Watson and
Professor Asa Gray, as they inform me ; but who will pretend
to say that they do not vary as much as the individual plants
of the same sub-variety of wheat? We have already seen
that pure varieties of wheat, cultivated in the same field, offer
many slight Variations, which can be selected and separately
propagated ; and that occasionally more strongly pronounced
variations appear, which, as Mr. Shirreff has proved, are well
worthy of extensive cultivation. Not until equal attention
be paid to the variability and selection of weeds, can the
argument from their constancy under unintentional culture
be of any value. In accordance with the principles of
selection we can understand how it is that in the several cul-
tivated varieties of wheat the organs of vegetation differ so
little ; for if a plant with peculiar leaves appeared, it would
‘ Les Cereales,’ p. 94.
33G
CEREAL PLANTS,
Chap. IX.
bo neglected unless the grains of corn were at the same time
superior in quality or size. The selection of seed-corn wa.«
strongly recommended in ancient times by Columella and
Celsus ; and as Virgil says, —
“ I’ve seen the largest seeds, tho’ viewed with care.
Degenerate, unless th’ industrious hand
Did yearly cull the largest.”
But whether in ancient times selection was methodically
pursued we may well doubt, when we hear how laborious tho
work has been found by Le Contour and Hallett. Although
the principle of selection is so important, yet the little which
man has effected, by incessant efforts during thousands of
years, in rendering the plants more productive or the grains
more nutritious than they were in the time of the old Egypt-
ians, would seem to speak strongly against its efficacy. But
we must not forget that at each successive period the state of
agriculture and the quantity of manure supplied to the land
will have determined the maximum degree of productiveness ;
for it would be impossible to cultivate a highly productive
variet3^, unless the land contained a sufficient supply of the
necessary chemical elements.
We now know that man was sufficiently civilized to culti-
vate the ground at an immensely remote period ; so that
wheat might have been improved long ago up to that standard
ofexcellence which was possible under the then existing state
of agriculture. One small class of facts supports this view of
the slow and gradual improvement of our cereals. In the
most ancient lake-habitations of Switzerland, when men
employed only flint-tools, the most extensively cultivated
wheat was a peculiar kind, with remarkably small ears and
graiiis.'^*^ “ Whilst the grains of the modern forms are in
section from seven to eight millimetres in length, the larger
grains from the lake habitations are six, seldom seven, and
the smaller ones only four. The ear is thus much narrower.
Quoted by Le Couteur, p. !6. bauten, ’ 1866. The foPoiring passage
A. De Candolle, ‘ G^ograpL Hot.,’ is quoted i'rom Dr. Christ, in ‘ Die
p 932. Fauna der Pfahlbauten, von Dr. RUti
■*** 0. Heer, ‘ Dio Pdaazen der Pfahl- meyer,’ 1861, s. 225.
Chap. IX.
WHEAT.
337
Biid tlie spikelets stand out more horizontally, than in our
present forms.” So again with barley, the most ancient and
most extensively cultivated kind had small ears, and the
grains were “ smaller, shorter, and nearer to each other, than
in that now grown ; without the husk they were 2 J lines long,
and scarcely I j broad, whilst those now grown have a length
of three lines, and almost the same in breadth.” These
small-grained varieties of wheat and barley are believed by
Heer to be the parent-forms of certain existing allied varieties,
which have supplanted their early progenitors.
Heer gives an interesting account of the first appearance
and final disappearance of the several plants which were
cultivated in greater or less abundance in Switzerland
during former successive periods, and which generally differed
more or less from our existing varieties. The peculiar small-
eared and small-grained wheat, already alluded to, was the
commonest kind during the Stone period ; it lasted down to
the Helvetico-Roinan age, and then became extinct. A second
kind was rare at first, but afterwards became more frequent.
A third, the Egyptian wheat (T. turgidum), does not agree
exactly with any existing variety, and was rare during the
Stone period. A fourth kind (T. dicoccum) differs from all
known varieties of this form. A fifth kind (T. moriococcum)
is known to have existed during the Stone period only by
the presence of a single ear. A sixth kind, the common
T. speJta, was not introduced into Switzerland until the
Bronze age. Of barley, besides the short-eared and small-
grained kind, two others were cultivated, one of which was
very scarce, and resembled our present common H. distichum.
During the Bronze age rye and oats were introduced; the
oat-grains being somewhat smaller than those produced by
our existing varieties. The poppy was largely cultivated
during the Stone period, probably for its oil ; but the variety
which then existed is not now known. A peculiar pea with
small seeds lasted from the Stone to the Bronze age, and then
became extinct ; whilst a peculiajr bean, likewise having small
seeds, came in at the Bronze period and lasted to the time
of the Romans. These details sound like the descriptions
** Heer, as quoted by Carl Vogt, ‘ Lectures on Man,’ Eng. translat. p. 35r>
£3
338
CEREAL PLANTS.
Chap. IX.
given by pakeontologists of the first appearance, tlie increasing
rarity, and final extinction or modi H cation of fossil species,
oinbcddcd in the successive stages of a geological formation.
Finally, every one must judge for himself ■whether it is
more probable tliat the several foj ms of wheat, barley, rye,
and oats are descended from between ten and fifteen species,
most of which are now either nnknoAvn or extinct, or whetlier
they are descended from between four and eight species,
which may have either closely resembled our present cultivated
forms, or have been so widely ditferent as to escape identifica-
tion. In this latter case we must conclude that man cultivated
the cereals at an enormously remote period, and that he
formerly practised some degree of selection, which in itself is
not improbable. We may, perhaps, further believe that, when
wheat was first cultivated the ears and grains increased
quickly in size, in the same manner as the roots of the wild
carrot and parsnip are known to increase quickly in bulk
under cultivation.
Maize or Jndian Corn : Zea ways. — Botanists are nearly imani-
mous that all the cultivated kinds belong to the same species.
It is undoubtedly of American origin, and was grown by the
iiborigines throughout the continent from New England to Chili.
Its cultivation must have been extremely ancient, for Tschudi
describes two kinds, now extinct or not known in Peru, which were
taken from tombs 'apparently prior to the dynasty of the Incas.
But there is even stronger evidence of antiquity, for I found on the
coast of Peru heads of maize, together with eighteen species of
recent sea-shell, embedded in a beach which had been upraised at
least 85 feet above the level of the sea. In accordance with this
ancient cultivation, numerous American varieties have arisen. The
aboriginal form has not as yet been discovered in the wild state.
A peculiar kind,^^ in which the grains, instead of being naked, are
See Alph. De Candolle’s long dis-
cussion in his ‘ Geograph. Bot.,’ p. 942.
With respect to New England, see Silli-
man’s ‘ American Journal,’ vol. xliv.
p. 99.
‘ Travels in Peru,’ Eng. translat.,
p. 177.
‘Geolog, Observ. on S. America,’
1816, p. 49.
This maize is figured in Bonafous’
magnificent work, ‘ Hist. Nat. du
Mais, 1836, PI. v. bis, and in the
‘Journal of Hort. Soc.,’ vol. i., 1846,
p. 115, where an account is given of
the result of sowing the seed. A
young Guarany Indian, on seeing this
kind of maize, told Auguste St. Hilaire
(see De Candolle, ‘ Geograph. Bot.,’ p.
951) that it grew wild in the humid
forests of his native land. Mr.
Teschemacher, in ‘ Proc. Boston Soc.
Hist.,’ Oct. 19th, 1842, gives au
account of sowing the seed.
Chap. IX.
MAIZE.
839
concealed by husks as much as eleven lines in length, has been
stated, but on insufficient evidence, to grow wild in Brazil. It is
almost certain that the aboriginal form would have had its grains
thus protected ; but the seeds of the Brazilian variety produce,
as I hear from Professor Asa Gray, and as is stated in two published
accounts, either common or husked maize ; and it is not credible
that a wild species, v/hen first cultivated, should vary so quickly
and in so great a degree.
Maize has varied in an extraordinary and conspicuous manner.
Metzger,®^ who paid particular attention to the cultivation oL this
plant, makes twelve races (unter-art) with numerous sub- varieties;
of the latter some are tolerably constant, others quite inconstant.
The different races vary in height from 15-18 feet to only 16-18
inches, as in a dwarf variety described by Bonafous. The whole
ear is variable in shape, being long and narrow, or short and thick,
or branched. The ear in one variety is more than four times as
long as in a dwarf kind. The seeds are arranged in the ear in from
six to even twenty rows, or are placed irregularly. The seeds
are coloured — white, pale-yellov/, orange, red, violet, or elegantly
streaked with black and in the same ear there are sometimes
seeds of two colours. In a small collection I found that a single
grain of one variety nearly equalled in w'eight seven grains of
another variety. The shape of the seed varies greatly, being very
flat, or nearly globular, or oval; broader than long, or longer than
broad ; without any point, or produced into a sharp tooth, and
this tooth is sometimes recurved. One variety (the rugosa of
Bonafous, and which is extensively cultivated in the United States
as sweet corn) has its seeds curiously wrinkled, giving to the whole
oar a singular appearance. Another variety (the cymosa of Bon.)
carries its ears so crowded together that it is called ma'is a bouquet.
The seeds of some varieties contain much glucose instead of starch.
Male flowers sometimes appear amongst the female flowers, and
Mr. J. Scott has lately obsersmd the rarer case of female flow^ers on
a true male panicle, and likewise hermaphrodite flowers.^^ Azara
describes a variety in Paraguay the grains of which are very
tender, and he states that several varieties are fitted for being cooked
ill various ways. The varieties also differ greatly in precocity, and
have different powers of resisting dryness and the action of violent
wind.^'® Some of the foregoing differences would certainly be con-
sidered of specific value with plants in a state of nature.
Le Comte Be states that the grains of all the varieties which he
54 Moquin-Tandon, ‘ Elements de
Teratologie,’ 1841, p. 126.
55 ‘Die Getreidearten,’ 1841, s. 208.
I have modified a few of Metzger’s
statements in accordance with those
made by Bonafous in his great work,
‘ Hist. Nat. du Mais,’ 1836.
56 Godron, ‘De I’Espece,’ tom. ii.
p. 80 ; Al. De Candolle, ibid., p. 951.
57 ‘ Transact. Bot. Soc. of Edin-
burgh,’ vol. viii. p. 60.
58 1 Voyages dans I’Amerique Meri-
dionale,’ tom. i. p. 147.
59 Bonafous, ‘ Hist. Nat. du Mais,’
p. 31.
340
CEREAL PLANTS.
CHi\r. IX
oultivatcd ultimately assumed a yellow colour. But Bouafous®*^
found that most of those which he sowed for ten consecutive years
kept true to their proper tints ; and he adds that in the valleys of
the Pyrenees and on the plains of Piedmont a white maize has bee^
cultivated for more than a century, and has undergone no change.
The tall kinds grown in southern latitudes, and therefore exjDosed
to great heat, require from six to seven months to ripen their seed ;
whereas the dwarf kinds, grown in northern and colder climates,
require only from three to four months.® ‘ Peter Kalm,®^ who
particularly attended to this plant, says, that in the United States,
in proceeding from south to north, the plants steadily diminish in
bulk. Seeds brought from lat. 37° in Virginia, and sown in lat.
43‘^-44° in New England, produce plants which will not ripen their
seed, or ripen them with the utmost difficulty. So it is with seed
carried from New England to lat. 45°-47° in Canada. By taking-
great care at first, the southern kinds after some years’ culture
ripen their seed perfectly in their noithern homes, so that this is an
analogous case with that of the conversion of suinmer into winter
wheat, and conversely. When tall and dwarf maize are planted
together, the dwarf kinds are in full flower before the others have
produced a single flower ; and in Pennsylvania they ripen their
seeds six weeks earlier than the tall maize. Metzger also mentions
a European maize wdiich ripens its seed four weeks earlier than
another European kind. With these facts, so plainly showing
inherited acclimatisation, we may readily believe Kahn, who states
that in North America maize and some other plants have gradually
been cultivated further and further nothward. All writers agree
that to keep the varieties of maize pure they must be planted
separately so that they shall not cross.
The effects of the climate of Europe on the American varieties is
highly remarkable. Metzger obtained seed from various parts of
America, and cultivated several kinds in Germany. I will give an
abstract of the changes observed in one case, namely, with a tall
kind (Breit-korniger mais, Zea altissima) brought from the -w^armer
parts of America. During the fii’st year the plants were twelvj
feet high, and a few seeds -were perfected; the lower seeds in the ear
kept true to their proper form, but the upper seeds became slightly
changed. In the second generation . the plants w^ere from nine to
ten feet in height, and ripened their seed better ; the depression on
the outer side of the seed had almost disappeared, and the original
beautiful white colour had become duskier. Some of the seeds had
even become yellow, and in their now rounded form they ap-
proached common European maize. In the third generation nearly
all resemblance to the original and very distinct American parent-
Ibid., p. 31.
61 Metzger, ‘ Getreidearteu,’ s. 206.
62 ‘ Description of Maize,’ by P.
Kahn, 1752, in ‘ Swedish Acts,’ vol.
iv. I have consulted an old English
MS. translation.
63 ‘ Getreidearten,’ s. 208.
Ujiap. IX. CULINARY PLANTS : CABBAGES. 34 i
form was lost. In the sixth generation this maize perfectly
resembled a European variety, described as the second sub- variety
of the fifth race. When Metzger published his book, this variety
was still cultivated near Heidelberg, and could be distinguished
from the common kind only by a somewhat more vigorous growth.
Analogous results were obtained by the cultivation of another
American race, the “ white-tooth corn,” in which the tooth nearly
disappeared even in the second generation. A third race, the
“ chicken corn,” did not undergo so great a change, but the seeds
became less polished and pellucid. In the above cases the seeds
were carried from a warm to a colder climate. But Fritz Muller
informs me that a dwarf variety with small rounded seeds (papa-
gaien-mais), introduced from Germany into S. Brazil, produces
plants as tall, with seeds as flat, as those of the kind commonly
cultivated there.
These facts afford the most remarkable instance known to
me of the direct and prompt action of climate on a plant.
It might have been expected that the tallness of the stem,
the period of vegetation, and the ripening of the seed, would
have been thus affected ; but it* is a much more surprising
fact that the seeds should have undergone so rapid and great
a change. As, however, flowers, with their product the seed,
are formed by the metamorphosis of the stem and leaves, any
modification in these latter organs would be apt to extend,
through correlation, to the organs of fructification
Cahhage (Brassica oleracea). — Every one knows how greatly the
various kinds of cabbage differ in appearance. In the Island of
Jersey, from the effects of particular culture and of climate, a stalk
has grown to the height of sixteen feet, and had its spring shoots
at the top occupied by a magpie’s nest : ” the woody stems are not
unfrequently from ten to twelve feet in height, and are there used
as rafters and as walking-sticks. We are thus reminded that in
certain countries plants belonging to the generally herbaceous
order of the Cruel ferae are developed into trees. Every one can
appreciate the difference between green or red cabbages with
great single heads; Brussel-sprouts v/ith numerous little heads;
broccolis and caulifl* >wers with the greater number of their flowers
in an aborted condition, incajDable of producing seed, and borne in
a dense corymb instead of an open panicle ; savoys with their
blistered and wrinkled leaves; and borecoles and kails, which
come nearest to the wild parent-form. There are also various
‘ Cabbage Timber, ‘ Gardener’s walking-stick made from a cabbage-
Chron.,’ 1856, p, 744, quoted from stalk is exhibited in the Museum al
Hooker’s ‘Journal of Botany.' A Kew.
342
CULINARY PLANTS.
IX
frizzled aud laciniated kinds, some of such beautiful colours that
Vilmorin in his Catalogue of 1851 enumerates ten varieties which
are valued solely for ornament. Some kinds are less commonly
known, such as the Portuguese Couve Tronchuda, with the ribs of
its leaves greatly thickened ; and the Kohlrabi or choux-raves,
with their stems enlarged into great turnip-like masses above the
ground; and the recently formed new race*^^ of the choux raves,
already including nine sub-varieties, in which the enlarged part
lies beneath the ground like a turnip.
Although we see such great differences in the shape, size, colour,
arrangement, and manner of growth of the leaves and stem, anti of
the flower-stems in the broccoli and cauliflower, it is remarkable
that the flowers themselves, the seed-pods and seeds, present ex-
tremely slight differences or none at all.®® I compared the flowers
of all the principal kinds; those of the Couve Tronchuda are white
and rather smaller than in common cabbages ; those of the Ports-
• mouth broccoli have narrower sepals, and smaller, less elongated
petals ; and in no other cabbage could any difference be detected.
With respect to the seed-pods, in the imrple Kohlrabi alone, do
they differ, being a little longer and narrower than usual. I made
a collection of the seeds of twenty-eight different kinds, and most
of them 'were undistinguishable ; when there was any difference
it \vas excessively slight ; thus, the seeds of various broccolis and
cauliflowers, when seen in mass, are a little redder; those of the
early green Ulm savoy are rather smaller ; and those of the Breda
kail slightly larger than usual, but not larger than the seeds of
the wild cabbage from the coast of Wales. What a contrast in
the amount of difference is j)resented if, on the one hand, we
compare the leaves and stems of the various kinds of cabbage with
their flowers, pods, and seeds, and on the other hand the corre-
sponding parts in the varieties of maize and wheat ! The expla-
nation is obvious ; the seeds alone are valued in our cereals, and
thejr variations have been selected; whereas the seeds, seed-pods,
and flowers have been utterly neglected in the cabbage, whilst
many useful v^ariations in their leaves and stems have been noticed
and preserved from an extremely remote period, for cabbages wxre
cultivated by the old Celts. ®^
It would be useless to give a classified description®® of the
numerous races, sub-races, and varieties of the cabbage; but it
may be mentioned that Dr. Bindley has lately proposed''® a system
founded on the state of development of the terminal and lateral
‘Journal de la Soc. Imp. d’Horti-
culture,’ 1855, p. 254, quoted from
‘ Gartenflora,’ Ap. 1855.
Godron, ‘ De I’Espece,’ tom. ii. p.
52 ; Metzger, ‘ Syst. Beschreihuug
icr Kult. Kohlarteu,’ 1833, s. f
Rpguier, ‘ De rEcouomie Fu 'diqu-^
des Celtes,’ 1818, p. 438.
See the elder De Candolle, in
‘Transact, of Hort. Soc.,’ vol. v. ; and
Metzger ‘ Kohlarten,’ &c.
‘Gardener’s Chronii le,’ 185i). p
992.
Chap. IX.
CABBAGES.
343
leaf-buds. Thus: I. All the leaf- buds active and oi3en, as in the
wild-cabbage, kail, &c. II. All the leaf-buds active, but forming
heads, as in Brussel-sprouts, &c. III. Terminal leaf-bud alone
active, forming a head as in common cabbages, savoys, &c. IV.
Terminal leaf-bud alone active, and open, with most of the flowers
abortive and succulent, as in the cauliflower and broccoli. Y. All
the leaf-buds active and open, with most of the flowers abortive
and succulent, as in the sprout ing-broccoli. This latter variety is
a new one, and bears the same relation to common broccoli, as
Brussel-sprouts do to common cabbages; it suddenly appeared
in a bed of common broccoli, and was found faithfully to transmit
its newly-acquired and remarkable characters.
The principal kinds of cabbage existed at least as early as the
sixteenth century,’'*^ so that 'numerous modifications of structure
have been inherited for a long period. This fact is the more
remarkable as great care must be taken to prevent the crossing of
the different kinds. To give proof of this : I raised 233 seedlings
from cabbages of different kinds, which had purposelj'^ been planted
near each other, and of the seedlings no less than 155 were plainly
deteriorated and mongrelized ; nor w^ere the remaining 78 all
perfectly true. It may be doubted whether many permanent
varieties have been formed by intentional or accidental crosses;
for such crossed plants are found to be very inconstant. One
kind, however, called Cottager’s Kail,” has lately been produced
by crossing common kail and Brussel-sj)routs, recrossed with
purple broccoli,^^ and is said to be true ; but plants raised by me
were not nearly so constant in character as any common kind of
cabbage.
Although most of the kinds keep true if carefully preserved from
crossing, yet the seed-beds must be yearly examined, and a few
seedlings ai’e generally found false ; but even in this case the force
of inheritance is shown, for, as Metzger has remarked when
speaking of Brussel-sprouts, the variations generally keep to their
unter art,” or main race. But in order that any kind may be
truly propagated there must be no great change in the conditions
of life; thus cabbages will not form heads in hot countries,
and the same thing has been observed wiili an English variety
grown during an extremely warm and damp autumn near Paris.^“
Extremely poor soil also affects the characters of certain varieties.
Most authors believe that all the races are descended from the
wild cabbage found on the western shores of Europe ; but Alph.
De Candolle forcibly argues, on historical and other grounds, that
it is more probable that two or three closely allied forms, generally
ranked as distinct species, still living in the Mediterranean region,
Alph. De Candolle, ‘Geograph.
Bet.’ pp. 842 and 989.
‘Gardener’s Chron.,’ Feb. 1858,
p. 128.
‘ Kohlarten,’ s. 22.
Godron, ‘ De I’Esp^ce,’ tom. ii. p
52 ; Metzger, ‘ Kohlarten,’ s. 22.
‘ Geograph. Bet.,’ p. 840,
344
CULINARY PLANTS.
Chap. IX.
arc the parents, now all commingled together, of the yarions
cultivated kinds. In the same manner as we have often seen with
domesticated animals, the supposed multiple origin of the cabbage
throws no light on the characteristic differences between the
cultiyated forms. If our cabbages are the descendants of three
or four distinct species, every trace of any sterility which may
originally have existed between them is now lost, for none of the
varieties can be kept distinct without scrupulous care to prevent
intercrossing.
The other cultivated forms of the genus Brassica are descended,
according to the view adopted by Godron and Metzger from two
species, B. na^ms and rap:t ; but according to other botanists from
three species ; whilst others again strongly suspect that all these
forms, both wild and cultivated, ought to be ranked as a single
species. Brassica napus has given rise to two large groups, namely,
Swedish turnips (believed to be of hybrid origin) and Colzas,
the seeds of which yield oil. Brassica rapa (of Koch) has also
given rise to two races, namely, common turnips and the oil-giving
rape. The evidence is unusually clear that these latter plants,
though so different in external axjpearance, belong to the same
species; for the turnip has been observed by Koch and Godron
to lose its thick roots in uncultivated soil; and when rape and
turnips are sown together they cross to such a degree^ that
scarcely a single plant comes true.'^^ Metzger by culture converted
the biennial or winter rape into the annual or summer rape, —
varieties which have been thought by some authors to be specifically
distinct.'^®
In the production of large, fleshy, turnip-like stems, we have
a case of analogous variation in three forms which are generally
considered as distinct species. But scarcely any modification seems
so easily acquired as a succulent enlargement of the stem or root —
that is, a store of nutriment laid up for the plant’s own future use.
We see this in our radishes, beet, and in the less generally known
“ turnip-rooted ” celery, and in the finocchio, or Italian variety of the
common fennel. Mr. Buckman has lately proved by his interesting
experiments how quickly the roots of the wild parsnip can be
enlarged, as Vilmorin formerly proved in the case of the carrot.'®
Godron, ‘ De I’Espfece,* tom. li. p.
54 ; Metzger, ‘ Kohlarten,’ s. 10.
‘ Gardener’s Chron. and Agricult.
Gazette,’ 1856, p. 729. Sce^ more
especially, ibid., 1868, p. 275: the
writer asserts that he planted a variety
of cabbage (.B. oleraced) close to turnips
rapa) and raised from the crossed
seedlings true Swedish turnips. These
latter plants ought, therefore, to be
classed with cabbages or turnips, and
not under B. napus.
’’’’ ‘ Gardener's Chron. and Agricult.
Gazette,’ 1855, p. 730.
Metzger, ‘ Kohlarten,’ s. 51.
These experiments by Vilmorin
have been quoted by many writers.
An eminent botanist. Prof. Decaisne,
has lately expressed doubts on the
subject from his own negative results,
but these cannot be valued equally
with positiv'e results. On the other
hand, M. Carribre has lately stated
(‘Gard. Chronicle,’ 1365, p. 1154),
Chap. IX.
PEAS.
345
This latter plant, in its cultivated state, ditfers in scarcely any
character from the wild English carrot, except in general luxuri-
ance and in the size and quality of its roots; but ten varieties,
differing in the colour, shape, and quality of the root, are cultivated
in England and come true by seed.®® Hence with the carrot, as
in so many other cases, for instance with the numerous varieties
and sub-varieties of the radish, that part of the plant which is
valued by man, falsely appears alone to have varied. . The truth
is that variations in this part alone have been selected ; and the
seedlings inheriting a tendency to vary in the same way, analogous
modifications have been again and again selected, untiE af last
a great amount of change has been effected.
With respect to the radish, M. Carriere, by sowing the seed of
the wild Baphanus raphanistrum in rich soil, and by continued
selection during several generations, raised many varieties, closely
like the cultivated radish (i?. sativus) in their roots, as well as the
wonderful Chinese vanety, R. caudatus : (see ‘ Journal d’Agriculture
pratique,’ t. i., 1869, p. 159 ; also a separate essay, ^ Origine des
Plants Homestiques,’ 1869.) Baphanus raphanistrum and sativus
have often been ranked as distinct species, and owing to differences
in their fruit even as distinct genera ; but Professor Hoffman Q Bot,
ZeitungV 1872, p. 482; has now shewn that these differences, re-
maikable as they are, graduate away, the fruit of R. caudatus
being intermediate. By cultivating R. raphanistrum during several
generations (ibid., 1873, p. 9), Professor Hoffman also obtained plants
bearing fruits like those of R. sativus.
I’ea (Pisum sativum'). — Most botanists look at the garden-pea
as specifically distinct from the field-pea (P. aryense). The latter
exists in a wild state in Southern Europe; but the aboriginal
parent of the garden-pea has been found by one collector alone,
as he states, in the Crimea.®^ Andrevv^ Knight crossed, as I am
informed by the Eev. A. Fitch, the field-pea with a well-known
garden variety, the Prussian pea, and the cross seems to have been
perfectly fertile. Dr. Alefeld has recently studied®^ the genus
with care, and, after having cultivated about fifty varieties, concludes
that certainly they all belong to the same species. It is an interest-
ing fact already alluded to, that, according to 0. Heer,®® the peas
found in the lake-habitations of Switzerland of the Stone and
Bronze ages, belong to an extinct variety, with exceedingly small
that he took seed from a wild carrot,
growing far from any cultivated land,
and even in the first generation the
Toots of his seedlings differed in being
spindle-shaped, longer, softer, and less
fibrous than those of the wild plant.-
From these seedlings he raised several
distinct varieties.
Loudon’s ‘ Encyclop. of Garden-
ag,’ p. 835.
Alph. De Gandoll®, ‘ Geograph.
Bot.,’ 960. Mr. Bentham (‘ Hort.
Journal,’ vol. ix. (1855), p. 141)
believes that garden and field peas
belong to the same species, and in this
respect he differs from Dr. Targioni.
‘Botanische Zeitung,’ 1860, s.
204.
‘Die Pflanzen der Ffahlbaufcen,
1866, s. 23.
CULINAKY PLANTS.
CllAl’. IX.
rM()
seeds, allied to P. arvense or the field-pea. The varieties of the
common garden-pea are numerous, ami differ considerably from
one another. For comparison I planted at the same time forty-one,
English and French varieties. They differed greatly in height, —
namely from between 6 and 12 inches to 8 feet, in manner of
growth, and in period of maturity. Some differ ' in general aspect
even while only two or three inches in height. The stems of the
Prussian pea are much branched. The tall kinds have larger
leaves than the dwarf kinds, but not in strict proportion to their
height : — Hair’s Dw nf Monmouth has very large leaves, and the
Fois nain hatif, and the moderately tall Blue Prussian, have leaves
about two-thirds of the size of the tallest kind. In the Panecroft
the leaflets are rather small and a little pointed ; in the Qiieen of
Dwarfs rather rounded ; and in the Queen of Krujland broad and
large. In these three peas the slight differences in the shape of the
leaves are accompanied by slight differences in colour. In the
Pois geant sans parchemin, which bears purple flowers, the leaflets
in the young plant are edged with red ; and in all the peas with
purple flowers the stipules are marked with red.
In the different varieties, one, two, or several flowers in a small
cluster, are borne on the same peduncle ; and this is a difference
which is considered of specific value in some of the Leguminosse.
In all the varieties the flowers closely resemble each other except
in colour and size. They are generally white, sometimes purple,
but the colour is inconstant even in the same variety. In li 'arner’s
Emperor, which is a tall kind, the flowers are nearly double the
size of the Pois nain hat if ; but Hairs Dwarf Monmouth, which
has large leaves, likewise has large flowers. The calyx in the Victoria
Marrow is large, and in Bishop's Long Pod the sepals are rather
narrow. In no otlier kind is there any difference in the flower.
The pods and seeds, which with natural species afford such
constant characters, differ greatly in the cultivated varieties of the
pea; and these are the valuable, and consequently the selected
parts. Sugar pea^, or Pois sans parchemin, are remarkable from
their thin pods, which, whilst young, are cooked and eaten whole ;
and in this group, which, according to Mr. Gordon includes eleven
sub- varieties, it is the pod which differs most ; thus Ijewis’s Negro-
podded pea has a straight, bruad, smooth, and dark- purple pod,
with the husk not so thin as in the other kinds ; the pod of another
variety is extremely bowed; that of the Pois geant it much pointed
at the extremity ; and in the variety a grands cosses ” the peas
are seen through the husk in so cons| iicuous a manner that the pod,
especially when dry, can hardly at first bo recognised as that of a pea.
In the ordinary varieties the iDods also differ much in size;—
in colour, that of Woodford’s Green Marrow being bright-green
A variety called the Rounciva series), vol. i., IS.Io, p. 374, fruic
attains this height, as is stated by Mr. which paper I have taken some facts
3ordou in ‘ Transact. Hoit. Soc.’ (2nd
Chap IX.
PEAS.
847
when dry, instead of pale brown, and that of the pnrple-podded
pea being expressed by its name ; — in smoothness, that of Banecroft
being remarkably glossy, whereas that of the 'Ne plus ultra is
rugged ; in being either nearly cylindrical, or broad and flat
in being pointed at the end, as in ThurstorCs Relinnce, or much
truncated, as in the American Diuarf. In the Auvergne pea the
whole end of the pod is bowed upwards. In the Queen of the Dwarfs
and in Scimitar peas the pod is almost dliptic in shape. I here
give drawings of the four most distinct pods produced by the
plants cultivated by me. -- — . ,
I. ir. jii lY.
a b c d
Fiir. 41.— Bods and Peas. I. Queen of Dwarfs. II. American Dwarf, ill. Tlnirsttai’s
Peliance. — IV Pois Geant sans parcbemin. a. Dan O’Rourke Pea. b. Queen of Dwarn
Pea. c. Knight’s Tall White Marrow, d. Lewis’s Ke-ru Pea.
348
CULINARY PLANTS.
Chap. IX
In the pea itself we have every tint between almost pure white,
brown, yellow, and intense green; in the varietits of ihQ’sugar peun
we have these same tints, together with red passing through fine
purple into a dark chocolate tint. These colours are either uniform
or distributed in dots, stria), or moss-like marks; they depend
in some cases on the colour of the cotyledons seen through the
skin, and in other cases on the outer coats of the pea itself. In
the different varieties, the pods contain, according to Mr. Gordon,
from eleven or twelve to only four or five peas. The largest peas
are nearly twice as much in diameter as the smallest ; and the
latter are not always borne by the most dwarfed kinds. Peas differ
much in shape, being smooth and spherical, smooth and oblong,
nearly oval in the Queen of the and nearly cubical and
crumpled in many of the larger kinds.
With respect to the value of the differences between the chief
varieties, it cannot be doubted that, if one of the tall Sugar-peas,
with purple flowers, thin-skinned pods of an extraordinary shape,
including large, dark-purple peas, grew wild by the side of the
lowly Queen of the with white flowers, greyish-green, rounded
leaves, scimitar-like pods, containing oblong, smooth, pale-coloured
peas, which became mature at a different season : or by the side
of one of the gigantic sorts, like the Champion of England, with
leaves of great size, pointed pods, and large, green, crumpled,
almost cubical peas, — all three kinds would be ranked as distinct
species.
Andrew Knight has observed that the varieties of peas keep
very true, because they are not crossed by insects. As far as the
fact of keeping true is concerned, I hear from Mr. Masters of
Canterbury, well known as the originator of several new kinds,
that certain varieties have remained constant for a considerable
time, — for instance, Knight's Blue Dwarf, which came out about
the year 1820.*^® But the greater number of varieties have a
singularly short existence : thus Loudon remarks that “ sorts
which were highly approved in 1821, are now, in 1833, nowhere to
be found ;” and on comparing the lists of 1833 with those of 1855,
I find that nearly all the varieties have changed. Mr. Masters
informs me that the nature of the soil causes some varieties to lose
their character. As with other plants, certain varieties can be
propagated truly, whilst others show a determined tendency to
vary ; thus two peas differing in shape, one round and the other
wrinkled, were found by Mr. Masters within the same pod, but the
plants raised from the wrinkled kind always evinced a strong
tendency to produce round peas. Mr. Masters also raised from a
plant of another variety four distinct sub-varieties, which bore blue
and round, white and round, blue and wrinkled, and white and
‘ Phii. Tract.’ 1799, p. 196. ‘Encyclopaedia of Gardening,’ p
‘ Gardener’s Magazine,’ vol. i., 823.
18267, p. 153.
CuAP. LX
PEAS.
349
wrinkled peas ; and altliougli he sowed these four varieties separately
during several successive years, each kind always reproduced all
four kinds mixed together !
With respect to the varieties not naturally intercrossing, I have
ascertained that the pea, which in this res})ect differs from some
other Leguminosse, is perfectly fertile without the aid of insects.
Yet I have seen humble-bees whilst sucking the nectar depress the
keel-petals, and become so thickly dusted with pollen, that it could
hardly fail to be left on the stigma of the next flower which was
visited. Nevertheless, distinct varieties growing closely together
rarely cross; and I have reason to believe that this is due to their
stigmas being prematurely fertilised in this country by pollen from
the same flower. The horticulturists who raise seed-peas are thus
enabled to plant distinct varieties close together without any bad
consequences ; and it is certain, as I have myself found, that true
seed may be saved during at least several generations under these
circumstances.®® Mr. Titch raised, as he informs me, one variety
for twenty years, and it always came true, though grown close to
other varieties. From the analogy of kidney-beans I should
have expected ®® that varieties thus circumstanced would have oc-
casionally crossed; and I shall give in the eleventh chapter two cases
of this having occurred, as shown (in a manner hereafter to be ex-
plained) by the pollen of the one variety having acted directly on the
seeds of the other. Whether many of the new varieties which in-
cessantly appear are due to such occasional and accidental crosses, I
do not know. Nor do I know whether the short existence of almost
all the numerous varieties is the result of mere change of fashion, or
of their having a weak constitution, from being the product of long-
continued self-fertilisation. It may, however, be noticed that several
of Andrew Knight’s varieties, which have endured longer than most
kinds, were raised towards the close of the last century by artificial
crosses ; some of them, I believe, were still vigorous in 1860 ;
but now, in 1865, a writer, speaking of Knight’s four kinds of
marrows, says, they have acquired a famous history, but their
glory has departed.
With respect to Beans (Faba vulgaris), I will say but little. Dr.
Alefeld has given short diagnostic characters of forty varieties.
Everyone who has seen a collection must have been struck with
the great difference in shape, thickness, proportional length and
breadth, colour, and size which beans present. What a contrast
between a Windsor and Horse-bean! As in the case of the pea,
our existing varieties were preceded during the Bronze age in
** See Dr. Anderson to the same
cffeot in the ‘ Bath Soc. Agricultural
Papers,’ vol. iv. p. 87.
I have published full details of
experiments on this subject in the
‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1857, Oct.
25.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1865, p
387.
‘ Bonplandia,’ .v., 1862, s. 348
350
CULINARY PLANTS.
Chap. IX
Switz(!rlaTid by a peculiar and now extinct variety producing
very small beans.^^
{Solarium tuheromm'). — There is little doubt about the
parentage of this plant ; for the cultivated varieties differ extremely
little in general appearance from the wild species, which can be
recognised in its native land at tlie first glance.^^ The varieties
cultivated in Britain are numerous; thus Lawson®^ gives a de-
scription of 175 kinds. I planted eighteen kinds in adjoining
rows ; their stems and leaves differed but little, and in several
cases there was as great a difference between the individuals of
the same variety as between the different varieties. The flower
varied in size, and in colour between white and purple, but in no
other respect, except that in one kind the sepals were somewhat
elongated. One strange variety has been described w hich always
produces two sorts of flowers, the first double and sterile, the
second single and fertile.®^ The fruit or berries also differ, but
only in a slight degree.^^ The varieties are liable in very different
degree to the attack of the Colorado potato-beetle.®*
The tubers, on the other hand, present a ’wonderful amount of
diversity. This fact accords with the principle that the valuable
and selected parts of all cultivated productions present the greatest
amount of modification. They differ much in size and shape, being
globular, oval, flattened, kidney-like, or cylindrical. One variety
from Peru is described ®® as being quite straight, and at least six
inches in length, though no thicker than a man’s finger. The eyes
or buds differ in form, position, and colour. The manner in which
the tubers are arranged on the so-called roots or rhizomes is
different ; thus, in the gurken-kartoffeln they form a pyramid with
the apex downwards, and in another variety they bury themselves
deep in the ground. The roots themselves run either near the
surface or deep in the ground. The tubers also differ in smoothness
Heer, ‘ Di>3 Pflau^ien der Pfahl-
aaten,’ 1866, s. 22.
Mr. Bentt.am informs me that in
Poitou and the adjoining parts of
F ranee, varieties of Phascolus vulgaris
are extremely numerous, and so dif-
ferent that they were described by Savi
as distinct species. Mr. Bentham
believes that all are descended from
an unknown eastern species. Al-
though the varieties differ so greatly
in stature and in their seeds, “ there
is a remarkable sameness in the ne-
glected characters of foliage and
dowers, and especially in the brac-
tonles, an insignificant char.acter in
the eyes even of botanists.”
®‘ Darwin, ‘ Journal of Researches,’
184.5, p. 285. Sabine, in ‘Transact
Hort. Soc.,’ vol. V. p. 249.
‘Synopsis of the Vegetable
Products of Scotland,’ quoted in
Wilson’s ‘ Bi’itish Farming,’ p. 317.
Sir G. Mackenzie, in ‘ Gardener’s
Chronicle,’ 1845, p. 790.
Putsche und Vertuch, ‘ Versuch
einer Monographie der Kartoffeln,’
1819, s. 9, 15. See also Dr. Anderson’s
‘ Recreations in Agriculture,’ vol. iv.
p. 325.
Walsh, ‘The American Entomo-
logist,’ 1869, p. 160. Also S. Tenney,
‘ The American Naturalist,’ May, 1871,
p. 171.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1862, p
1052.
CuAr. IX.
POTATOES.
351
and colour, being externally white, red, pnrple, or almost black,
and internally white, yellow, or almost black. They differ in
flavour and quality, being either waxy or mealy ; in their period of
maturity, and in their capacity for long preservation.
As with many otlier plants which have been long propagated by
bulbs, tubers, cuttings, (fee., by which means the same individual is
exposed during a length of time to diversified conditions, seedling
potatoes generally display innumerable slight differences. Several
varieties, even when propagated by tubers, are far from constant, as
will be seen in the chapter on Bud- variation. Br. Anderson
procured seed from an Irish purj)le potato, which grew far from
any other kind, so that it could not at least in this generation have
been crossed, yet the many seedlings varied in almost every possible
respect, so that scarcely two plants were exactly alike.” Some of
the plants which closely resembled each other above ground, pro-
duced extremely dissimilar tubers ; and some tubers which externally
could hardly be distinguished, differed widely in quality when
cooked. Even in this case of extreme variability, the parent-stock
had some influence on the progeny, for the greater number of the
seedlings resembled in some degree the parent Irish potato. Kidney
potatoes must be ranked amongst the most highly cultivated
and artificial races; nevertheless their peculiarities can often be
strictly propagated by seed. A great authority, Mr. Eivers,^°^
states that seedlings from the ash-leaved kidney always bear a
strong resemblance to their parent. Seedlings from the fluke-
kidney are still more remarkable for their adherence to their parent
stock, for, on closely observing a great number during two seasons,
I have not been able to observe the least difference, either in earliness,
productiveness, or in the size or shape of their tubers.” ?
100 ‘ Bath Society Agricult. Papers,’ loi ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1863, p.
vol. V. p. 127. And ‘ Eecreations in 643.
Agriculture,’ vol. v. p. 86.
352
FRUITS.
Chap. X.
CHAPTER X.
PLANTS — FRUITS— ORNAMENTAL TREES — FLOWERS.
FRUIT’S — GRAPES — VARY IN ODD AND TRIFLING PARTICULARS.-^ MUL-
BERRY— THE ORANGE GROUP — SINGULAR RESULTS FROM CROSSING.
PEACH AND NECTARINE — BUD VARIATION — ANALOGOUS VARIATION —
RELATION TO THE ALMOND, APIfICOT. PLUMS — VARIATION IN
THEIR STONES. CHERRIES — SINGULAR VARIETIES OF. APPLE.
PEAR. STRAWBERRY — INTERBLENDING OF THE ORIGINAL FORMS.
GOOSEBERRY — STEADY INCREASE IN SIZE OF THE FRUIT — VARIETIES OF.
WALNUT. NUT. CUCURBITACEOUS PLANTS— WONDERFUL VARIA-
TION OF.
ORNAMENTAL TREES — their variation in degree and kind —
ASH -TREE — SCOTCH-FIR — HAWTHORN.
FLOWERS — Ml LTIPLE ORIGIN OF MANY KINDS — VARIATION IN CONSTITU-
TIONAL PECULIARITIES — KIND OP VARIATION. ROSES — SEVERAL SPECIES
CULTIVATED. PANSY. DAHLIA. HYACINTH —HISTORY AND
VARIATION OF.
The Vine {Vitis vinifera). — The best authorities consider all onr
grapes as the descendants of one species which now growls wild in
western Asia, which grew wild during the Bronze age in Italy, ^ and
which has recently been found fossil in a tufaceous deposit in the
south of France.^ Some authors, however, entertain much doubt
about the single parentage of our cultivated varieties, owing to the
number of semi-wild forms found in Southern Europe, especially as
described by Clemente® in a forest in Spain; but as the grape sown
itself freely in Southern Europe, and as several of the chief kinds
transmit their characters by seed,^ whilst others are extremely
variable, the existence of many different escaped forms could hardly
-fail to occur in countries wdiere this plant has been cultivated from
the remotest antiquity. That the vine varies much when propagated
by seed, w^e may infer from the largely increased number of varieties
since the earlier historical records. New hot-house varieties are
* Heer, ‘ Pflanzen der Pfahlbauten,’
1866, s. 28.
* Alph. De Candolle, ‘ Geograph.
Bot.,’ p. 872 ; Dr. A. Targioni-
Tozzetti, m ‘Jour. Hort. Soc.,’ vol ix.
p. 133. For the fossil vine found by
Dr. G. Planchon, see ‘ Nat. Hist.
Review,’ 1865, April, p. 224. See
also the valuable works of M. do
Saporta on the ‘Tertiary Plants of
France.’
^ Godron, ‘ De I’Espece,’ tom. ii. p.
100.
Nee an account of M. Vibert’s ex-
periments, by Alex. Jordan, in ‘ Mem,
de I’Acad. de Lyon,’ tom. ii. 1852, p.
108.
Chap. X.
VINES.
35:1
produced almost every year; for instance,® a golden-coloured
variety lias been recently raised in England from a black grape
without the aid of a cross. Van Mons® reared a multitude ol
varieties from the seed of one vine, which w^as completely separated
from all others, so that there could not, at least in this generation,
have been any crossing, and the seedlings presented “ les analogues
de toutes les sortes,” and ditfercd in almost every possible charactei
both in the fruits and foliage.
The cultivated varieties are extremely numerous ; Count Odart
says that he will not deny that there may exist throughout the
world 700 or 800, perhaps even 1000 varieties, but not a third of
these have any value. In the catalogue of fruit cultivated in the
Horticultural Gardens of London, published in 18d2, 99 varieties
are enumerated. Wherever the grape is grown many varieties
occur : Pallas describes 24 in the Crimea, and Burnes mentions 10
in Cabool. The classification of the varieties has much perplexed
writers, and Count Odart reduced to a geographical system; but
I will not enter on this subject, nor on the many and great dif-
ferences between the varieties. I will merely specify a few curious
and trifling peculiarities, all taken from OdarPs highly esteemed
work,"^ for the sake of showing the diversified variability of this
plant. Simon has classed grapes into two main divisions, those
with downy leaves, and those with smooth leaves, but he admits
that in one variety, namely the Eebazo, the leaves are either smooth,
or downy; and Odart (p. 70) states that some varieties have the
nerves alone, and other varieties their young leaves, downy, whilst
the old ones are smooth. The Pedro- Ximenes grape (Odart, p. 397)
presents a peculiarity by which it can be at once recognised amongst
a host of other varieties, namely, that wdien the fruit is nearly ripe
the nerves of the leaves or even the whole surface becomes yellow.
The Barbera d’Asti is well marked by several characters (p. 426),
amongst others, “ by some of the leaves, and it is always the lowest
on the branches, suddenly becoming of a dark red colour.” Several
authors in classifying grapes have founded their main divisions on
the berries being either round or oblong ; and Odart admits the
value of this character; yet there is one variety, the Maccabeo
(p. 71), which often produces small round, and large oblong, berries
in the same bunch. Certain grapes called Nebbiolo (p. 429) present
a constant character, sufficient for their recognition, namely, “ the
slight adherence of that part of the pulp which surrounds the seeds
to the rest of the berry, when cut through transversely.” A Ehenish
variety is mentioned (p. 228) which likes a dry soil; the fruit ripens
well, but at the moment of mat irity, if much rain falls, the berries
are apt to rot ; on the other hand, the fruit of a Swiss variety (p. 243)
is valued for well sustaining prolonged humidity. This latter
5 ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1864, p. p. 290.
488. Odart, ‘ Ampelographie Univer-
« ‘ Arbres Fruitiers,’ 1836, tom. ii. selle,’ 1849.
24
554.
FIIUITS :
CiiAr. X.
variety sprouts late in the spring, yet matures its fruit early ; other
varieties (p. 862) have the fault of being too much excited by the
April sun, and in consequence sutfer from frost. A Styrian variety
(j). 254) has brittle foot-stalks, so that the clusters of fruit are
often blow^n off; this variety is said to be particularly attractive to
wasps and bees. Other varieties have tough stalks, which resist
the wind. Many other variable characters could be given, but the
foregoing facts are sufficient to show in how many small structural
and constitutional details the vine varies. During the vine disease
in France certain old groups of varieties ® have suffered far more
fiom mildew than others. Thus “ the group of Gliasselas, so rich
in varieties, did not afford a single fortunate exception certain
other groups suffered much less ; the true old Burgundy, for instance,
was comparatively free from disease, and the Carminat likewise
resisted the attack. The American vines, which belong to a distinct
species, entirely escaped the disease, in Fnince; and we thus see
that those European varieties which best resist the disease must
have acquired in a slight degree the same constitutional peculiarities
as the American species.
White Mulbe try {Morus olha).—l mention this plant because it
has varied in certain characters, namely, in the texture and quality
of the leaves, fitting them to serve as food for the domesticated
silkworm, in a manner not observed with other plants ; but this
has arisen simply from such variations in the mulberry having been
attended to, selected, and rendered more or less constant. M. de
Quatrefages ® briefly describes six kinds cultivated in one valley in
France : of these the amourouso produces excellent leaves, but is
rapidly being abandoned because it produces much fruit mingled
with the leaves: the antofino yields deeply cut leaves of the finest
quality, but not in great quantity : the daro is much sought for
because the leaves can be easily collected : lastly, the roso bears
strong hardy leaves, produced in large quantity, but with the one
inconvenience, that they are best adapted for the worms after their
fourth moult. MM. Jacquemet-Bonnefont, of Lyon, however, remark
in their catalogue (1862) that two sub- varieties have been confounded
under the name of the roso, one having leaves too thick for the
caterpillars, the other being valuable because the leaves can easily
be gathered from the branches without the bark being torn.
In India the mulberry has also given rise to many varieties.
The Indian form is thought by many botanists to be a distinct
species; but as Eoyle remarks,^® ‘‘so many varieties have been
produced by cultivation that it is difficult to ascertain whether they
® M. Bouchardat, in ‘ Comptes Ren-
dns,’ Dec. 1st, 1851, quoted in ‘ Gar-
dener’s Chron.,’ 1852, p. 435. See
also C. V. Riley on the manner in
which some few of the varieties of
the American Labruscan Vine escape
‘ho attacks of the Phylloxera: ‘Fourth
Annual Report on the Insects oi
Missouri,’ 1872, p. 63, and ‘ Fifth Re-
port,’ 1873, p, 66.
® ‘ Etudes sur les Maladies actuelle?
d\i Ver a Sole,’ 1859, p. 321.
‘ Productive Resources of India,
p 130.
Chap X.
ORANGE GROUP.
3557
all belong to one si-tecies they a.re, as he adds, nearly as nuni5pi(3s if
as those of the silkworm. orange
The Orange Group. — We here meet with great confysion leaves,
specific distinction and parentage of the several kinds. GalJ mixed
who almost devoted his life-time to the subject, considers thapes and
are four species, namely, sweet and bitter oranges, lemoiroj^c, qj. ^
citrons, each of which has given rise to whole groups of varieties, '
monsters, and supposed hybrids. One high authority believes
that these four reputed species are all varieties of the wild Citrus
medica, but that the shaddock ( decumana), which is not known
in a. wild state, is a distinct species ; though its distinctness is
doubted by another writer of great authority on such matters,”
namely. Dr. Buchanan Hamilton. Alph. De Candolle, on the
other hand — and there cannot be a more capable judge— advances
what he considers sufficient evidence of the orange (he doubts
whether the bitter and sweet kinds are specifically distinct), the
lemon, and citron, having been found wild, and consequently that
they are distinct. He mentions two other forms cultivated in Japan
and Java, which he ranks undoubted species; he speaks rather
more doubtfully about the shaddock, which varies much, and has
not been found wild ; and finally he considers some forms, such as
Adam’s apple and the bergamotte, as probably hybrids.
I have briefly abstracted these opinions for the sake of showing
those who have never attended to such subjects, how perplexing
they are. It would, therefore, be useless for my purpose to give a
sketch of the conspicuous differences between the several forms.
Besides the ever- recurrent difficulty of determining whether forms
found wild are truly aboriginal or are escaped seedlings, many of
the forms, which must be ranked as varieties, transmit their
characters almost perfectly by seed. Sweet and bitter oranges
differ in no important respect except in the flavour of their fruit,
but Gallesio^^ is most emphatic that both kinds can be propagated
by seed with absolute certainty. Consequently, in accordance with
his simple rule, he classes them as distinct species; as he does
sweet and bitter almonds, the peach and nectarine, &c. He admits,
however, that the soft-shelled pine-tree produces not only soft-
shelled but some hard-shelled seedlings, so that a little greater
force in the power of inheritance would, according to this rule,
raise a soft-shelled pine-tree into the dignity of an aboriginally
created species. The positive assertion made by Macfayden that
” ‘Traits di: Citrus,’ 1811.
* Teoritv della Riproduzioue Vegetale,’
1816. 1 quote chiefly from this
second work. In 1839 Gallesio pub-
lished in folio ‘ Gli Agrumi dei Giard.
Bot. di Firenze,’ in which he gives a
curious diagram of the supposed
relationship of all the forms.
Mr. Bentham, ‘ Review of Dr. A.
Targioni-Tozzetti, ‘ Journal of Hort.
Soc.,’ vol. ix. p. 133.
‘ Geograph. Bot.,’ p. 863.
‘ Teoria della Riproduzione,’ pp.
52-57.
tiooker’s ‘ Bot. Misc.,’ vol. i p
302 ; Vol. ii. p 111.
FRUITS :
Chap. X.
.56
varieiips of s'vcct oranges produced in Jamaica, according to tlie
varieti.of the soil in which they are sown, either sweet or bitter
April o, is j)robably an error; for M. Alph. De Candolle informs
(jj. 25':it since the publication of his great work he has received
often bi^ fi’oni Guiana, the Antilles, and Mauritius, that in these
vvonxeviox sweet oranges faithfully transmit their character. Gallesio
round that the willow-leafed and the Little China oranges re-
produced their proper leaves and fruit; but the seedlings were
not quite equal in merit to their parents. The red-Heshed orange,
on the other hand, fails to reproduce itself. Gallesio also observed
that the seeds of several other singular varieties all reproduced
trees having a peculiar physiognomy, partly resembling their
parent-forms. I can adduce another case : the myrtle leaved
orange is ranked by all authors as a variety, but is very distinct in
general aspect ; in my father’s greenhouse, during many years, it
rarely yielded any fruit, but at last produced one ; and a tree thus
raised was identical with the parent-form.
Another and more serious difficulty in determining the rank of
the several forms is that, according to Gallesio,^*^ they largely
intercross without artificial aid; thus he positively states that
seeds taken from lemon-trees (C. lemonum) growing mingled with
the citron ( G. medic /), which is generally considered as a distinct
species, produced a graduated series of varieties between these two
forms. Again, an Adam’s apple was produced from the seed of a
sweet orange, which grew ch^se to lemons and citrons. But such
facts hardly aid us in determining whether to rank these forms as
species or varieties ; for it is now known that undoubted species of
Verbascum, Cistus, Primula, Salix, &c., frequently cross in a state
of nature. If indeed it were proved that plants of the orange tribe
raised from these crosses were even partially sterile, it would be a
strong argument in favour of their rank as species. Gallesio
asserts that this is the case ; but he does not distinguish between
sterility from hybridism and from the effects of cultuin ; and he
almost destroys the force of this statement by another,^^ namely,
that when he impregnated the flowers of the common orange with
the pollen taken from undoubted varieties of the orange, monstrous
fruits were produced, which included “little pulp, and had no
seeds, or imperfect seeds.”
In this tribe of plants we meet with instances of two highly
remarkable facts in yegetable physiology: Gallesio^® impregnated
an orange with pollen from a lemon, and the fruit borne on the
mother tree had a raised stripe of peel like that of a lemon both in
colour and taste, but the pulp was like that of an orange and
included only imperfect seeds. The possibility of pollen from one
variety or species directly affecting the fruit produced by another
variety of species, is a subject which I shall fully discuss in the
following chapter.
‘ Teoria della Riproduzione,’ p. 53.
Gallesio, ‘Teoria della Riproduziono,’ p. 69. Ibid. p. 67.
Chap. X.
PEACH AND NECTARINE.
357
The second remarkable fact is, that two supposed hybrids '^
(for their hybrid nature was not ascertained), between an orange
and either a lemon or citron, produced on the same tree leaves,
f.owers, and fruit of both pure parent- forms, as well as of a mixed
or crossed nature. A bud taken from any one of the branches and
grafted on another tree produces either one of the pure kinds or a
capricious tree reproducing the three kinds. Whether the sweet
lemon, which includes within the same fruit segments of differently
flavoured pulp,^° is an analogous case, I know not. But to this
subject 1 shall have to recur.
I will conclude by giving from A. Eisso a short account of a
very singular variety of the common orange. It is the “ citi us
aurantium fructu variahili’' which on the young shoots produces
rounded-oval leaves spotted with yellow, borne on petioles with
heart-shaped wings ; when these leaves fall off, they are succeeded
by longer and narrov/er leaves, with undulated margins, of a pale-
green colour embroidered with yellow, borne on footstalks without
wings. The fruit whilst young is pear-shaped, yellow, longitu-
dinally striated, and sweet; but as it ripens, it becomes spherical,
of a reddish-yellow, and bitter.
Peach and Aecfarine {Amygdalus persica). The best authorities
are nearly unanimous that the peach has never been found wild.
It was introduced from Persia into Europe a little before the
Christian era, and at this period few varieties existed. Alph. Be
Candolle,-^ from the fact of the peach not having spread from Persia
at an earlier period, and from its not having pure Sanscrit or
Hebrew names, believes that it is not an aboriginal of W^estern
Asia, but came from the terra incognita of China. The supposition,
however, that the peach is a modified almond which acquired its
present character at a comparatively late period, would, I presume,
account for these facts ; on the same principle that the nectarine, the
offspring of the peach, has few native names, and became known in
Europe at a still later period.
Andrew Knight/® from finding that a seedling-tree, raised from a
sweet almond fertilised by the pollen of a peach, yielded fruit quite
like that of a peach, suspected that the peach-tree is a modified
almond ; and in this he has been followed by various authors."^ A
first-rate peach, almost globular in shape, formed of soft and sweet
Gallesio, ‘Teoria della Ripto-
luzione,’ pp. 75, 76.
‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1841, p.
618.
‘Annales du Museum,’ tom. xx.
p 188.
‘Geograph. Bot.,’ p. 882.
‘ Transactions of Hort. Soc.,’ vA.
iii. p. 1, and vol. iv. p. 896, and note
to p. 370. A coloured drawing is
given of this hybrid.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1856, p.
532. A writer, it may be presumed
Dr. Liudley, remarks on the perfect
series which may be formed between
the almond and the peach. Another
high authority, Mr. Rivers, who has
had such wide experience, strongly
suspects (‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,' 1863,
p. 27) that peaches, if left to a state
of nature, would in the cours e of time
retrograde into thick-fleshed almonds.
o58
FRUITS :
Ceai . X,
pulp, surrounding a hard, much furrowed, and slightly flattened
stone, certainly differs greatly from an almond, with its soft,
slightly furrowed, much flattened, and elongated stone, protected
FiK- 42. — Peach and Almond Stones, of natural size, viewed edgewaj's. 1. Common English
peach. 2. Double, crimson-flov\ered, Chinese beach 3. Chiiuse Honey Peach. 4.
English Almond. 5. Baiceluna Almond, ti. iVlalaga Almond. 7. Soft-shelled Fieuch
Almond. 8. Smyrna Almond.
by a tough, greenish layer of bitter flesh. Mr. Bentham has par-
ticularly called attention to the stone of the almond being so much
more flattened than that of the peach. But in the seYcral varieties
‘ Journal of Hort. Soc., vol. :x. p, 168.
Chap. X.
PEACH AND NECTARINE.
359
of the almond, the stone differs greatly in the degree to which
it is compressed, in size, shape, strength, and in the depth of the
furrows, as may be seen in the accompanying drawing (Nos. 4
to 8) of such kinds as I have been able to collect. With peach-
stones also (Nos. 1 to 3) the degree of compression and elongation is
seen to vary; so that the stone of the Chinese Honey-peach (fig. 3)
is much more elongated and compressed than that of the (No. 8)
Smyrna almond. Mr. Rivers, of Sawbridgeworth, to whom I am
indebted for some of the specimens above figured, and who has had
such great horticultural experience, has called my^ttention to
several varieties which connect the almond and the peach. In
France there is a variety called tlie Peach- Almond, which Mr.
Rivers formerly cultivated, and which is correctly described in a
French catalogue as being oval and swollen, with the aspect of a
peach, including a hard stone surrounded by a fleshy covering,
which is sometimes eatable.^° A remarkable statement by M.
Luizet has recently appeared in the ‘ Revue Horticole,’ namely,
that a Peach-almond, grafted on a peach, bore, during 1863 and
1864, almonds alone, but in 1865 bore six peaches and no almonds.
M. Carriere, in commenting on this fact, cites the case of a double-
flowered almond which, after producing duriug several years almonds,
suddenly bore for two years in succession spherical fleshy peacfli-
like fruits, but in 1865 reverted to its former state and produced
large almonds.
Again, as I hear from Mr. Rivers, the double-flowering Chinese
peaches resemble almonds in their manner of growth and in their
flowers ; the fruit is much elongated and flattened, with the flesh
both bitter and sweet, but not uneatable, and it is said to be of
better quality in China. From this stage one small step leads us
to such inferior peaches as are occasionally raised from seed. For
instance, Mr. Rivers sowed a number of peach-stones imported from
the United States, where they are collected for raising stocks, and
some of the trees raised by him produced peaches whicdi were very
like almonds in appearance, being small and hard, with the pulp
not softening till very late in the autumn. Van Moiis^^ also states
that he once raised from a peach-stone a peach having the aspect
of a wild tree, with fruit like tliat of the almond. From inferior
peaches, such as these just described, we may pass by small transi-
tions, through clingstones of poor quality, to our best and most
melting kinds. From this gradation, from the cases of sudden varia-
tion above recorded, and from the fact that the peach has not been
found wild, it seems to me by far the most probable view, that
Whether this is the same variety produces during successive years very
a.s one lately mentioned (• Card. ditferent kinds of fruit.
Chion.’ 1865, p. 1 154-) by M. t^arriere . Quoted in ‘ Gard. Chro.i.’ 1866,
under the n:\me of persica intermedia, p. 800.
I know uot ; this variety is said to be Quoted in ‘Journal dc la Soc
ntermediate in nearly all its charac- Imp. d’Horticulture,’ 1855, p. 238.
ters between the almond and peach ; it
360
FRUITS :
Chap. X
the peach is the descendant of the almond, improved and modified
in a marvellous manner.
One fact, however, is opposed to this conclusion. A hybrid,
raised by Knight from the sweet almond by the pollen of the peach,
produced flowers with little or no pollen, yet bore fruit, having
been apparently fertilised by a neighbouring nectarine. Another
hybrid, from a sweet almond by the pollen of a nectarine, produced
during the first three years imperfect blossoms, but afterwards
perfect flowers with an abundance of pollen. If this slight degree
of sterility cannot be accounted for by the youth of the trees (and
this often causes lessened fertility), or by the monstrous state of
the flowers, or by the conditions to which the trees were exposed,
these two cases would afford a good argument against the peach
being the descendant of the almond.
Whether or not the peach has proceeded from the almond, it
has certainly given rise to nectarines, or smooth peaches, as they
are called by the French. Most of the varieties, both of the peach
atid nectarine, reproduce themselves truly by seed. Gallesio says
he has verified this with respect to eight races of the peach.
Mr. Eivers^® has given some striking instances from his own
experience, and it is notorious that good peaches are constantly
raised in North America from seed. Many of the American sub-
varieties come true or nearly true to their kind, such as the white-
blossom, several of the yellow-fruited freestone peaches, the blood
clingstone, the heath, and the lemon clingstone. On the other
hand, a clingstone peach has been known to give rise to a freestone.^^
In England it has been noticed that seedlings inherit from their
X)arents flowers of the same size and colour. Some characters,
however, contrary to what might have been expected, often are
not inherited ; such as the presence and form of the glands
on the leaves.®^ With respect to nectarines, both cling and free-
stones are known in North America to reproduce themselves by
seed.^'"^ In England the new white nectarine was a seedling of the
old white, and Mr. Eivers^'^ has recorded several similar cases.
From this strong tendency to inheritance, which both peach and
nectarine trees exhibit, — from certain slight constitutional differ-
ences in their nature, — and from the great difference in their
fruit both in appearance and flavour, it is not surprising, notwith-
standing that the tiees differ in no other respects and cannot even
‘ Teoria della Riprorluzione Vege-
tale,’ 1816, p. 86.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1862, p.
1195.
Mr. Rivers, ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’
1859, p. 774.
Downing, ‘ The Fruits of Ame-
rica,’ 1845, pp. 475, ^89, 492, 494,
196. also F. Michaux, ‘ 'I'ravels
‘n Kf. America’ (Fng. trails] at.), p.
228. For similar cases in France see
Godron, ‘ De I’Espece,’ tom. ii. p. 97.
23 Brickell’s ‘ Nat. Hist, of N.
Carolina,’ p. 102, and Downing’s
‘ Fruit Trees,’ p. 605.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,' 1862, p.
1196.
22 The peach and nectarine do not
succeed equally well in the same soil
see Lindley’s ‘ Horticulture,’ p. 3-51.
Chap. X.
PEACH AND NECTARINE.
361
be distinguished, as I am informed by Mr. Rivers, whilst young,
that they have been ranked by some authors as specifically distinct.
Gallesio does not doubt that they are distinct ; even Alph. De Candolle
does not appear perfectly assured of their specific identity: and an
eminent botanist has quite recently maintained that the nectarine
“ probably constitutes a distinct species.”
Hence it may be worth while to give all the evidence on the
origin of the nectarine. The facts in themselves are curious, and
will hereafter have to be referred to when the important subject
of bud-variation is discussed. It is asserted that the Boston
nectarine was produced from a peach-stone, and this nectarine
reproduced itself by seed.^® Mr. Rivers states^® that from stones
ot three distinct varieties, of the peach he raised three varieties
of nectarine; and in one of these cases no nectarine grew near
the parent peach-tree. In another instance Mr. Rivers raised a
nectarine from a peach, and in the succeeding generation another
nectarine from this nectarine.^® Other such instances have been
communicated to me, but they need not be given. Of the converse
case, namely, of nectarine- stones yielding peach-trees (both free and
clingstones), we have six undoubted instances recorded by Mr.
Rivers ; and in two of these instances the parent nectarines had
been seedlings from other nectarines.'’^
With respect to the more curious case of full-grown peach-trees
suddenly producing nectarines by bud-variation (or sports as they
are called by gardeners), the evidence is superabundant ; there is
also good evidence of the same tree producing both peaches and necta-
rines, or half-and-half fruit ; by this term I mean a fruit with the
one-half a perfect peach, and the other half a perfect nectarine.
Peter Collinson in 1741 recorded the first case of a peach-tree
producing a nectarine,''^ and in 1766 he added two other instances.
In the same work, the editor. Sir J. E. Smith, describes the more
remarkable case of a tree in Norfolk which usually bore both
perfect nectarines and perfect peaches; but during two seasons
■some of the fruit were half and half in nature.
Mr. Salisbury in 1808 records six other cases of peach-trees
producing nectarines. Three of the varieties are named ; viz., the
Alberge, Belle Chevreuse, and Royal George. This latter tree seldom
failed to produce both kinds of fruit. He gives another case of
a half-and-half fruit.
At Radford in Devonshire a clingstone peach, purchased as
Godron, ‘De I’Espfece,’ tom. ii.,
1859, p. 97.
‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. vi. p.
394.
Downinij’s ‘ Fruit Trees,’ p. 502.
‘ (tardener’s Chronicle,’ 1862, p.
1 1 95.
‘.Journal of Horticulture,’ Feb.
5th, 1866, p. 102.
■“ Mr. Rivers, in ‘ Gardener’s
Chron.,’ 1859, p. 774, 1862, p, 1 195 ;
1865, p. 1059 ; and ‘ Journal of Hort.,’
1866, p. 102.
‘ Corre.spnndence of Tdnnaeus,’
1821, pp. 7, 8, 70.
‘Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. i. p.
103.
Loudon’s ‘ Ganlener’s Mag ,’
1826, vol. i. p. 471.
362
FRUITS.
Chap. X.
the Chancellor, was planted in 1815, and in 1824, aft-er having
previously produced peaches alone, bore on one branch twelve
nectarines; in 1825 the same branch yielded twenty-six nectarines,
and in 1826 thirty-six nectarines, together with eighteen peaches.
One of the peaches was almost as smooth on one side as a nectarine.
The nectarines were as dark as, but smaller than, the Elruge.
At Beccles a Royal George peach produced a fruit, “three
parts of it being peach and one part nectarine, quite distinct in
appearance as well as in flavour.’^ The lines of division were
longitudinal, as represented in the woodcut. A nectarine- tree
grew five yards from this tree.
Professor Chapman states.^® that he has often seen in Virginia
very old peach-trees bearing nectarines. ,
A writer in the ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle ’ says that a peach tree
planted fifteen years previously produced this year a nectarine
between two peaches ; a nectarine-tree grew close by.
In 1844^^ a Vanguard peach-tree produced, in the midst of its
ordinary fruit, a single red Roman nectarine.
Mr. Calver is Stated‘S® to have raised in the United States
a seedling peach which produced a mixed crop of both peaches ami
nectarines.
Near Dorking®® a branch of the Teton de Venus peach, which
reproduces itself truly by seed,®^ bore its own fruit “ so remarkable
for its prominent point, and a nectarine rather smaller but well
formed and quite round.”
The previous cases all refer to peaches suddenly producing
nectarines, but at Garde w®^ the unique case occurred, of a ntictariiie-
tree, raised twenty years before from seed and never grafted,
producing a fruit half peach and half nectarine ; subsequently bore
a perfect peach.
To sum up the foregoing facts; we have excellent evidence of
peach-stones producing nectarine-trees, and of nectarine-stones
producing peach-trees, — of the same tree-bearing peaches and
nectarines, — of peach-trees suddenly producing by bud- variation
nectarines (such nectarines reproducing nectarines by seed), as
well as fruit in part nectarine and in part peach,— and, lastly, of
one. nectarine-tree first bearing half-and-half fruit, and subsequently
true peaches. As the peach came into existence before the nectarine,
it might have been expected from the law of reversion that,
nectarines would have given birth by bud-variation or by seed
to peaches, oftener than peaches to nectarines ; but this is by no
means the case.
*•'* London’s, ‘ Gardener’s Mag.,’
1828, p. 53.
Ibid., 1830, p. 597.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1841. p.
617.
‘Gai'dener’s Chronicle,’ 1844, p.
589.
‘ Phytologist,’ vol. iv. p. 299.
‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1856, p.
531.
Godron, ‘ De I’Espbce,’ tom. ii. p.
97.
‘Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1856, p
53 1
Chap. X.
PEACH AND NECTARINE.
363
Two explanations have been suggested to account for these
eonversions. First, that the parent trees have been in every case
hybrids between the peach and nectarine, and have reverted
by bud- variation or by seed to one of their pure parent forms.
This view in itself is not very improbable ; for the Mountaineer
peach, which was raised by Knight from the red nutmeg-peacli
l)y pollen of the violette hative nectarine, produces peaches, but
these are said sometimes to partake of the smoothness and flavour
of the nectarine. But let it be observed that in the previous list
no less than six well-known varieties and several unnamed varfeties
of the peach have once suddenly produced perfect nectarines by
bud variation : and it would be an extremely rash supposition
that all these varieties of the peach, which have been cultivated
for years in many districts, and which show not a vestige of
a mixed parentage, are, nevertheless, hybrids A t-econd explana-
tion is, that the fruit of the peach has been directly affected by the
pollen of the nectarine : although this certainly is possible, it
cannot here apply; for we have not a shadow of evidence that
a branch which has borne fruit directly affected by foreign pollen
is so profoundly modified as afterwards to produce buds which
continue to yield fruit of the new and modified form. Now it
is known that when a bud on a peach-tree has once borne a nectarine
the same branch has in several instances gone on during successive
years producing nectarines. The Carclew nectarine, on the other
hand, tirst produced half-and-half fruit, and subsequently pure
peaches. Hence we may confidently accept the common view that
the nectarine is a variety of the peach, which may be produced
either by bud-variation or from seed. In the following chapter
many analogous cases of bud- variation will be given.
The varieties of the peach and the nectarine run in parallel lines.
In both classes the kinds differ from each other in the flesh of the
fruit being white, red, or yellow; in being clingstones or freestones;
in the flowers being large or small, with certain other characteristic
differences; and in the leaves being serrated without glands,
or crenated and furnished with globose or reniform giands.^-’^ \'Ve
can hardly account for this parallelism by supposing that each
variety of the nectarine is descended from a corresponding variety
of the peach ; for though our nectarines are certainly the descend-
ants of several kinds of peaches, yet a large number are the
descendants of other nectarines, and they vary so much when
thus reproduced that w^e can scarcely admit the above explanation.
The varieties of the peach have largely increased in number
since the Christian era, when from t^vo to five varieties were
known ; and the nectarine was unknown. At the present time,
Alph. De Cand.ille, ‘ Geograph. Hurt. Soc.,’ 1842, p. 105.
Bot., p. 886. Dr. A. Targioni-Tozzetti, ‘ Jour-
Thompson, in Loudon’s ‘Ency- nal Hort. See.,’ vol. ix. p. 167. Alph
olop. of Gardening,’ p. 911. de Candolle, ‘Geograph. Bot.,’ p
‘Catalogue of Fruit in Garden of 885.
564
FRUITS :
Chat. X
besides many varieties said to exist in China, Downing describes,
in tlie United States, seventy-nine native , and imported varieties
of the peach; and a few years ago Lindley®^ enumerated one
hundreci and sixty-four varieties of the peach and nectarine grown
in England. I have already indicated the chief points of difference
between the several varieties. Nectarines, even when produced
from distinct kinds of peaches, always possess their own peculiar
flavour, and are smooth and small. Clingstone and freestone
peaches, which differ in the ripe flesh either firmly adhering to
the stone, or easily separating from it, also differ in the character
of the stone itself; that of the freestones or melters being more
deeply fissured, with the sides of the fissures smoother than
in clingstones. In the various kinds the flowers differ not only
in size, but in the larger flowers the petals are differently shape<i,
more imbricated, generally red in the centre and pale towards
the margin : whereas in the smaller flowers the margin of the
petal are usually more darkly coloured. One variety has nearly
white flowers. The leaves are more or less serrated, and are either
destitute of glands, or ha\e globose or reniform glands;®** and some
few peaches, such as the Brugnen, bear on the same tree both
globular and kidney-shaped glands.®® According to Eobertson
the trees with glandular leaves are liable to blister, but not in any
great degree to mildew ; whilst the uon-ginndular trees are more
subject TO curl, to mildew, and to the attacks of aphides. The
varieties differ in the period of their maturity, in the fruit keeping
well, and in hardiness, — the latter circumstance being especially
attended to in the United States. Certairi varieties, such as the
Bellegarde, stand forcing in hot-houses better than other varieties.
The flat-peach of China is the most remarkable of all the varieties ,
it is so much depressed tow'ards the summit, that the stone is here
covered only by roughened skin and not by a fleshy la^er.®'
Another Chinese variety, called the Honey-peach, is remarkable
from the fruit terminating in a long sharp point; its leaves are
glandless and widely deiitate.®^ The Emperor of Eussia peach
is a third singular variety, having dee])ly double-serrated leaves ;
the fruit is deeply cleft with one-half projecting considerably
beyond the other: it originated in America, and its seedlings
inherit similiar leaves.®®
The peach has also produced in China a small class of trees
\alued for ornament, namely the double-flowered; of these, five
‘Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. v. p.
554. See also Carriere, ‘ Description et
Class, des Varietes de Pechers.’
‘ Loudon’s ‘ Lucyclop. of Garden-
ing,’ i>. 9U7.
M. Carriere, in‘Gard. Chron.,’
1865, p. 1154.
‘ Transact. Ilort. Soc.,’ vol. iii.
p. 332 Sec also ‘ G.irJeuer's Chronicle,’
1865, p, 271, to same effect. Also
‘Journal of Horticulture,’ Sept. 26th,
1865, p. 254.
^ Transact. Hort. Soc.’ vol, iv. p.
512.
‘Journ.il of Horticulture,’ Sept.
8th, 1853, p. 188.
‘Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. vi.
p. 412
Chav. X.
APRICOTS,
805
varieties are now known in England, varying from pure white,
through rose, to intense crimson.®'^ One of these varieties, called
the camellia-flowered, bears flowers above inches in diameter,
whilst those of the fruit-bearing kinds do not at most exceed 1 j
inch in diameter. The flowers of the double-flowered peaches have
the singular property®^ of frequently producing double or treble
fruit. Finally, there is good reason to believe that the peach is an
almond profoundly modified; but whatever its origin may have
been, there can be no doubt that it has yielded during the last
eighteen centuries many varieties, some of them strongly charac-
terised, belonging both to the nectarine and peach form.
Apricot (^Frunus armeniucd). — It is commonly admitted that this
tree is descended from a -single species, now found wild in the
Caucasian region.®® On this view the varieties deserve notice,
because they illustrate differences supposed by some botanists to
be of specific value in the almond and plum. The best monograph
on the apricot is by Mr. Thompson,®'^ who describes seventeen
varieties. We have seen that peaches and nectarines vary in a
strictly parallel manner ; and in the apricot, wdiich forms a closely
allied genus, we again meet with variations analogous to those of
the peach, as well as to those of the plum. The varieties differ
considerably in the shape of their leaves, which are either serrated
or crenated, sometimes with ear like appendages at their bases,
and sometimes with glands on the petioles. The flowers are
generally alike, but are small in the Masculine. The fruit varies
much in size, shape, and in having the suture little pronounced
or absent ; in the skin being smooth, or downy, as in the orange-
apricot; and in the flesh clinging to the stone, as in the last-
mentioned kind, or in readily separating from it, as in the
Turkey -apricot. In all these differences we see the closest analogy
with the varieties of the peach and nectarine. In the stone v/e
have more important differences, and these in the case of the plum
have been esteemed of specific value : in some apricots the stone is
almost spherical, in others much flattened, being either sharp in
front or blunt at both ends, sometimes channelled along the back,
or wuth a sharp ridge along both margins. In the Moorpark, and
generally in the Eemskirke, the stone presents a singular character
in being perforated, with a bundle of fibres passing through the
perforation from end to end. The most constant and important
character, according to Thompson, is whether the kernel is bitter
or sweet : yet in this respect we have a graduated difference, for
the kernel is very bitter in Shipley’s apricot; in the Eemskirke
less bitter than in some other kinds ; slightly bitter in the Eoyal ;
and “ sweet like a hazel-nut ” in the Breda, Angoumois, and others.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1857, p. Bot.,’ p. 879.
216. ‘Transact. Hort. Soc.’ (2nd
‘Journal of Hort. Soc.,’ voL ii. series), vol. i. 1835, p. 56, See also
p. 283. ‘ Cat. of Fruit in Garden of Hort. Soc.,
Alph. de Candolle, ‘ Geograph, 3rd edit. 1842.
3G6
FRUITS :
Chai*. X.
In file case of the almond, bitterness has been thought by some
high authorities to indicate specific difference.
In N. America the Eoman apricot endures “ cold and unfavour-
able situations, 'S’vhere no other sort, except the Masculine, will
succeed; and its blossoms bear quite a severe frost without
injury.”®® According to Mr. Rivers,®^ seedling apricots deviate but
little from the character of their race : in France the Alberge is
constantly reproduced from seed with but little variation. In
Ladakh, according to Moorcroft,"^® ten varieties of the apricot, very
different from each other, are cultivated, and all are raised from
seed, excepting one, which is budded.
Plums {t^runvs insititui). — Formerly the sloe, P. s'pinosa, was
thought to be the parent of all our plums ; but now this honour is
1 2
6 6 7
Fig. 43. — Plum Stones, of natural siz'^, -viewed laterally. 1. Bullace Plum. 2. Shropshire
Damson. 3. Blue Gaga. 4. Orleans. 5. Elvas. 6. Danyei’s Victoria. 7. Diamond,
very commonly accorded to P. irisititia or the bullace, which is
found wild in the Caucasus and N.-Western India, and is natural-
ised in England.'^^ It is not at all improbable, in accordance with
some observations made by Mr. Eivers,’^^ that both these forms,
which some botanists rank as a single species, may be the parents
of our domesticated plums. Another supposed parent-form, the
P. domestica, is said to be found wild in the region of the Caucasus.
Downing, ‘ The Fruits of Ame-
rica,’ 1845, p. 157 : with respect to
the Alberge apricot in France, see p,
153,
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle.’ 1863, p.
364.
‘Travels in the Himalayan Pro-
vinces,’ vol. i. 1841, p. 295,.
See an excellent discussion on
this subject in Hewett C. Watson’s
‘ Cybele Britannica,’ vol. iv. p. 80.
’’2 ‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1865, p
27.
Chap. X.
PLUMS.
367
Godron remarks'^® tliat the cultivated varieties may be divided into
two main groups, which he supposes to be descended from two
aboriginal stocks; namely, those with oblong fruit and stones
pointed at both ends, having narrow separate petals and upright
branches ; and those with rounded fruit, with stones blunt at both
ends, with rounded petals and spreading branches. From what
we know of the variability of the flowers in the peach and of the
diversified manner of growth in our various fruit-trees, it is difficult
to lay much weight on these latter characters. With respect to
the shape of the fruit, we have conclusive evidence that it is
extremely variable : Downing gives outlines of the plums of. dwo
seedlings, namely, the red and imperial gages, raised from the
greengage; and the fruit of both is more elongated than that of the
greengage. The latter has a very blunt broad stone, whereas the
stone of the imperial gage is “oval and pointed at both ends.*’
These trees also differ in their manner of growth : “ the greengage
is a very short-jointed, slow-growing tree, of spreading and rather
dwarfish habit ; ” whilst its offspring, the imperial gage, “ grows
freely and rises rapidly, and has long dark shoots.” The famous
Washington plum bears a globular fruit, but its offspring, the
emerald drop, is nearly as much elongated as the most elongated
plum figured by Downing, namely. Manning’s prune. I have made
a small collection of the stones of twenty-five kinds, and they
graduate in shape from the bluntest into the sharpest kinds. As
characters derived from seeds are generally of high systematic
importance, I have thought it worth while to give drawings of the
most distinct kinds in my small collection ; and they may be seen
to differ in a surprising manner in size, outline, thickness, promi-
nence of the ridges, and state of surface. It deserves notice that
the shape of the stone is not always strictly correlated with that of
tire fruit : thus the Washington plum is spherical and depressed at
the pole, with a somewhat elongated stone, whilst the fruit of
the Goliath is more elongated, but the stone less so, than in the
Washington. Again, Denyer’s Victoria and Goliath bear fruit
closely resembling each other, but their stones are widely different.
On the other hand, the Harvest and Black Margate plums are very
dissimilar, yet include closely similar stones.
The varieties of the plum are numerous, and differ greatly in
size, shape, quality, and colour, — being bright yellow, green, almost
white, blue, purple, or red. There are some curious varieties, such
as the double or Siamese, and the Stoneless plum ; in the latter the
‘ De TEspfece,’ tom. ii. p. 94. On 278, 284, 310, 314. Mr. Rivers
the parentage of our plums, see also raised (‘ Gard. Chron.,’ 1863, p. 27)
Alph. De Candolle, ‘ Geograph. Bot.,’ from the Prune-peche, which bears
p. 878. Also Targioni-Toiszetti, ‘Jour- large, round, red plums on stout,
nal Hort. Soc.,’ vol. ix. p. 164. Also robust shoots, a seedling which bears
Babington, ‘ Manual of Brit. Botany,’ oval, smaller fruit on shoots that are
18M, p. 87. so slender as to be almost pendulous.
‘ Fruits of America,’ pp. 276,
FRUITS :
Chap. X.
36S
kernel lies in a roomy cavity surrounded only by the pulp. The
climate of North America appears to be singularly favourable for
the production of new and good varieties; Downing describes no
less than forty, of which seven of first-rate quality have been
recently introduced into England.'^^ Yarieties occasionally arise
having an innate adaptation for certain soils, almost as strongly
pronounced as with natural species growing on the most distinct
geological formations ; thus in America the imperial gage, differently
from almost all other kinds, “ is peculiarly fitted for dry light soils
where many sorts drop their fruit,” whereas on rich heavy soils the
fruit is often insipid.'^*^ My father could never succeed in making
the Wine-Sour yield even a moderate crop in a sandy orchard near
Shrewsbury, whilst in some parts of the same county and in its
native Yorkshire it bears abundantly : one of my relations also
repeatedly tried in vain to grow this variety in a sandy district in
Staffordshire.
Mr. Rivers has given a number of interesting facts, showing
how truly many varieties can be propagated by seed. He sowed
the stones of twenty bushels of the greengage for the sake of raising
stocks, and closely observed the seedlings; all had the smooth shoots,
the prominent buds, and the glossy leaves of the greengage, but the
greater number had smaller leaves and thorns.” There are two
kinds of damson, one the Shropshire with downy shoots, and the
other the Kentish with smooth shoots, and these differ but slightly
in any other respect : Mr. Rivers sowed some bushels of the Kentish
damson, and all the seedlings had smooth shoots, but in some
the fruit was oval, in others round or roundish, and in a few the
fruit was small, and, except in being sweet, closely resembled that
of the wild sloe. Mr. Rivers gives several other striking instances
of inheritance : thus, he raised eighty thousand seedlings from the
common German Quetsche plum, and “not one could be found
varying in the least, in foliage or habit.” Similar facts were observed
with the Petite Mirabelle plum, yet this latter kind (as well as the
Quetsche) is known to have yielded some well-established varieties;
but, as Mr. Rivers remarks, they all belong to the same group with
the Mirabelle.
Cherries (Frunus cerasus, avium, &c.). — Botanists believe that our
cultivated cherries are descended from one, two, four, or even more
wild stocks.'^® That there must be at least two parent species we
may infer from the sterility of twenty hybrids raised by Mr. Knight
from the morello fertilized by pollen of the Elton cherry ; for these
hybrids produced in all only five cherries, and one alone of these
” ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,' 1855, p.
726.
Downing’s ‘Fruit Trees,’ p. 278.
‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1863, p.
27. Sageret, in his ‘ Fomologie Phys.,’
p. 348, enumerates five kinds which
Oiin be propagated in France by sec.l ;
see also Dowming’s ‘ Fruit Trees ol
America,’ p. 305, 312, &c.
Compare Alph. De Canlolle,
‘ Geograph, Bot.,’ p. 877 ; Bentham
and Targioni-Tozzetti, in ‘ Hort. .Joi;r-
ai,’ vol. ix. p. 163 ; Gourou, ‘ De
I’Espbce,’ tom. ii. {». 02,
Chap. X.
CHERRIES— APPLES.
369
contained a seed.'^^ Mr. Thompson has classified the varielies in
an apparently natural method in two main groups by characters
taken from the flowers, fruit, and leaves ; but some varieties w^hich
stand widely separate in this classification are quite fertile when
crossed- thus Knight’s Early Black cherries is the product of a cross
between two such kinds.
Mr. Knight states that seedling cherries are more variable than
those of any other fruit-tree.®^ In the Catalogue of the Horticultural
Society for 1842, eighty varieties are enumerated. Some varieties
present singular characters : thus, the flower of the Cluster cherry
includes as many as twelve pistils, of which the majority abort ; -and
they are said generally to j)roduce from two to five or six cherries
aggregated together and borne on a single peduncle. In the Ratafia
cherry several flower-peduncles arise from a common peduncle,
upwards of an inch in length. The fruit of Gascoigne’s Heart has
its apex produced into a globule or drop ; that of the white Hunga-
rian Gean has almost transparent flesh. The Flemish cherry is “ a
very odd-looking fruit,” much flattened at the summit and base,
with the latter deeply furrowed, and borne on a stout, very short
footstalk. In the Kentish cherry the stone adheres so firmly to the
footstalk, that it could be drawn out of the fl.esh ; and this renders
the fruit well fitted for drying. The Tobacco-leaved cherry, accord-
ing to Sageret and Thomxjson, produces gigantic leaves, more than
a foot and sometimes even eighteen inches in length, and half a foot
in breadth. The weeping cherry, on the other hand, is valuable
only as an ornament, and, according to Downing, is '' a charming
little tree, with slender, weeping branches, clothed with small, almost
myrtle-like foliage.” There is also a peach-leaved variety.
Sageret describes a remarkable variety, U griottier de la Toussaint,
which bears at the same time, even as late as September, flowers and
fruit of all degrees of maturity. The fruit, which is of inferior
quality, is borne on long, very thin footstalks. But the extraordinary
statement is made that all the leaf-bearing shoots spring from old
flower- buds. Lastly, there is an important physiological distinction
between those kinds of cherries which bear fruit on young or on old
wood ; but Sageret positively asserts that a Bigarreau in his garden
bore fruit on wood of both ages.®^
Apple {Pyrus malus). — The one source of doubt felt by botanists
with respect to the parentage of the apple is whether, besides P.
raalus, two or three other closely allied wild forms, namely, P. acerha
and prcjecox or paradisiaca, do not deserve to be ranked as distinct
‘Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. v.,
1824, p. 295.
IbiJ., second series, vol. i., 1835,
p. 248.
Ibid., vol. ii. p. 138.
These several statements are
taken from the four fo. lowing works,
which may, I believe, be trusted :
25
Thompson, in ‘ Hort. Transact.,’ see
.above; Sageret ’s ‘ Pomologie Phys.,’
1830, pp. 358, 364, 367, 379 ; ‘ Cata-
logue of the Fruit in the Garden
'of Hort. Soc.,’ 1842, pp. 57, 60 ;
Downing, ‘The Fruits of America.
1.845, pp. 189, 195 200.
370
FRUITS :
Chap. X.
spec.es. The P. proecox is supposed by some authors*^ to l)e tl'.e
j)arent of the dwarf i)aradise stock, which, owing to the fibrous roots
not penetrating deeply into the ground, is so largely used for
grafting; but the paradise stocks, it is asserted,^’^ cannot be propa-
gated true by seed. The common wild crab varies considerablj' in
England ; but many of the varieties are believed to be escaped
seedlings.®^ Every one knows the great difference in the manner
of growth, in the foliage, flowers, and especially in the fruit, between
the almost innumerable varieties of the apple. The pips or seeds
(as I know by comparison) likewise diifer considerably in sbaj^e,
size, and colour. The fruit is adapted for eating or for cooking in
various w’ays, and keeps for only a few weeks or for nearly two
j'ears. Some few kinds have the fruit covered .with a powdery
secretion, called bloom, like that on plums; and “it is extremely
remarkable that this occurs almost exclusively among varieties
cultivated in Russia.” Another Russian apple, the white Astracan,
possesses the singular property of becoming transparent, when ripe,
like some sorts of crabs. The api etoile has five pi’ominent ridges,
hence its name ; the upi noir is nearly black : the twin cluster pippin
• often bears fruit joined in pairs. . The trees of the several sorts
differ greatly in their periods of leafing and flowering; in my
orchard the Court Pendu Plat produces leaves so late, that during
several springs I thought that it was dead. The Tiffin apple
scarcely bears a leaf when in full bloom ; the Cornish crab, on the
other hand, bears so many leaves at this period that the flowers
can hardly be seen.®® In some kinds the fruit ripens in mid-
summer; in others, late in the autumn. These several differences
in leafing, flowering, and fruiting, are not at all necessarily cor-
related ; for, as Andrew Knight has remarked,®^ no one can judge
from the early flowering of a new seedling, or from the early
shedding or change of colour of the leaves, whether it will mature
its fruit early in the season.
The varieties differ grea.tly in constitution. It is notorious that
our summers are not hot enough for the Newtown Pippin, wRich
Mr. Lowe states in his ‘ Flora of
Madeira’ (quoted in ‘ Gard. Chron.,’
1862, p. 215) that the P.malus, with
its nearly sessile fruit, ranges farther
south than the long-stalked P. acerha^
which is entirely absent in Madeira,
the Canaries, and apparently in Por-
tugal. This fact supports the belief
that these two forms deserve to be
called species. But the characters
separating them are of slight import-
ance, and of a kind known to vary in
other cultivated fruit-trees.
‘ Journ. of llort. Tour, by
Deputation of the Caledonian Hort.
Soc.,’ 1823, p. 459.
H. C. Watson, ‘Cybele Britan-
nica,’ vol. i. p. 334.
Loudon’s ‘ Gardener’s Mag.,’ vol.
vi., 1830, p. 83.
See ‘Catalogue of Fruit in Gar-
den of Ilort. Soc.,’ 1842, and
Downing’s ‘ American Fruit Trees.’
Loudon’s • Gardener's Magazine,’
vol. iv., 1828, p. 1122.
‘ The Culture of the Apple,’ p.
43. Van Mons makes the same remark
on the pear, ‘ Arbres Fruitiers,’ tom.
ii., 1836., p. 414.
Liadley’s ‘ Horticulture,’ p. 116
CiiAr. X.
APPLES.
371
is the glory of the orchards near New York: and so it is with
several varieties which we have imported from the Continent. On
the other hand, our Court of Wick succeeds well under the severe
climate of Canada. The Calville roucje <ie Micoud occasionally bears
two crops during the same year. The Burr Knot is covered witli
small excrescences, which emit roois so readily that a branch with,
blossom-buds may be stuck in tlie ground, and will root and bear a
few fruit even during the first year.^^ Mr. Pavers has recently
described®^ some seedlings valuable from their roots running near
the surface. One of these seedlings was remarkable from its
extremely dwarfed size, “forming itself into a bush only a few
inches in height.” Many varieties are particularly liable to canker
in certain soils. But perhaps the strangest constitutional 23eculiarity
is that the Winter Majetin is not attacked by the mealy bug or
coccus; Bindley®^ states that in an orchard in Norfolk infested
with these insects the Majetin was quite free, though the stock on
which it was grafted was affected : Knight makes a similar state-
ment with respect to a cider a^^ple, and adds that he only once
saw these insects just above the stock, but that three days after-
wards they entirely disappeared ; this apple, however, was raised
from a cross between the Golden Harvey and the Siberian Crab;
and the latter, I believe, is considered by some authors as specitic-
ally distinct.
The famous St. Valery apple must not be passed over; the flower
has a double calyx with ten divisions, and fourteen styles sur-
mounted by conspicuous oblique stigmas, but is destitute of stamens
or corolla. The fruit is constricted round the middle, and is formed
of five seed-cells, surmounted by nine other cells.^'* Not being
See also Knight on the Apple-Tree, in
‘Transact, of Hort. Soc.,’ vol. vi. p. 22i».
‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. i.
1812, p. 120.
‘ Journal of Horticulture,’ March
13th, 1866, p. 194.
‘Transact. Hort. Soc.,’vol. iv. p.
68. For Knight’s case, vol. vi. p.
547. When the coccus first appeared
in this country, it is said (vol. ii. p.
]63) that it was more injurious to
crab-stocks than to the apples grafted
on them. The Majetin apple has been
found equally free of the coccus at Mel-
bourne in Australia Gard. Chron.’
1871, p. 1065). The wood of this
tree has been there anadysed, and it is
said (but the fact seems a strange one)
that its ash contained over 50 per
cent, of lime, while that of the crab
exhibiied not quite 23 per cent.
In Tasmania Mr. Wade (‘ Transact.
New Zealand Institute,’ vol. iv., 1871,
p. 431) raised seedlings of the Siberian
Bitter Sweet for stocks, and he found
barely one per cent, of them attacked
by the coccus. Kiley shows (‘ Fifth
Report on Insects of Missouri,’ 1 873, p.
87) that in the United States some
varieties of apples are highly attrac-
tive to the coccus and others very
little so. Turning to a very different
pest, namely, the caterpillar of ;i
moth {Carpocapsa 'pomonellcC)^ Walsh
affirms (‘ The American Entomologist,’
April, 1869, ]>. 160) that the maiden-
blush “ is entirely exempt from
appl -worms.” So, it is said, are
some few other varieties ; whereas
others are “ peculiarly subject to
the attacks of this little pest.”
‘ Mem. de la Sac. Linn, de Paris,
tom. iii., 1825, p. 164; and Seringe.
‘ Bulletin Bot.’ 1830, p. 117.
372
FRUITS;
Chap. X.
provided with stamens, the tree requires artificial fertilisation ; and
the girls of St. Valery annually go to ‘‘faire ses j^ommes,” eacli
marking lier own fruit with a ribbon; and as different pollen is
used the fruit differs, and we here have an instance of the direct
action of foreign pollen on the mother plant. These monstrous
apples include, as we have seen, fourteen seed-cells; the pigeon-
apple,®^ on the other hand, has only four, instead of, as with all
common apples, five cells; and this certainly is a remarkable
:liffe].*ence.
In the catalogue of apples published in 1842 by the Horticultural
Society, 897 varieties are enumerated ; but the differences between
most' of them are of comparatively little interest, as tbc'y are not
‘jtrictly inherited. No one can raise, for instance, from the seed of
the Ribston Pippin, a tree of the same kind ; and it is said that the
‘ Sister Ribston Pippin ” was a white semi-transparent, sour- fleshed
ap]'>le, or rather large crab.®'^ Yet it was a mistake to suppose that
with most varieties the characters are not to^ a certain extent
inherited. In two lots of seedlings raised from two well-marked
kinds, many worthless crab-like seedlings will appear, but it is now
known that the two lots not only usually differ from each other, but
resemble to a certain extent their parents. We see this indeed in
the several sub-groups of Eussetts, Sweetings, Codlins, Pearmains,
Reinettes, &c.,®^ which are all believed, and many are known, to be
descended from other varieties bearing the same names.
Pears {Pyrus communis). — I need say little on this fruit, which
varies much in the wdld state, and to an extraordinary degree when
cultivated, in its fruit, flowers, and foliage. One of the most
celebrated botanists in Europe, M. Decaisne, has carefully studied
the many varieties ;®® although he formerly believed that they were
derived from more than one species, he now thinks that all belong
to one. He has arrived at this conclusion from finding in the
several varieties a perfect gradation between the most extreme
characters ; so perfect is this gradation that he maintains it to be
impossible to classify the varieties by any natural method. M.
Decaisne raised many seedlings from four distinct kinds, and has
carefully recorded the variations in each. Notwithstanding this
extreme degree of variability, it is now positively known that many
kinds reproduce by seed the leading characters of their race.®® -
Strawberries {Fragaria). — This fruit is remarkable on account
of the number of species which have been cultivated, and from
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1849, p.
24.
R. Thompson, in ‘ Gardener’s
Chron.,’ 1850, p. 788.
Sageret, ‘ Pomologie Physiolo-
giqne,’ 1830, p. 263. Downing’s
‘ Fruit Trees,’ pp. 130, 134, 139, &c.
Loudon’s ‘Gardener’s Mag.,’ vol. viii.
p. 317. Alexis Jordan, ‘ De POrigine
des diverses Varie't^s,’ in ‘ Mem. de
I’Acad. Imp. de Lyon,’ tom. ii., 1852,
pp. 95, 114. ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’
185 \ pp. 774, 788.
‘Comptes Rendus,’ July 6th
1863.
‘Gardener’s Chroniede,’ 1856, p
804; 1857, p. 820 ; 1862, j). 1195
Chap. X.
STRAWBERRIES.
373
their rapid improvement within the last fifty or sixty years. Let
any one compare the fruit of one of the largest varieties exhibited
at our Shows with that of the wild wood strawberry, or, which
will be a fairer comparison, with the somewhat larger fruit of the
wild American Virginian Strawberry, and he will see what prodigies
horticulture has efected.^°® Tlie number of varieties has likewise
increased in a surprisingly rapid manner. Only three kinds were
knowm in France, in 1746, where this fruit was early cultivated.
In 1766 five species had been introduced, the same which are now
cultivated, but only five varieties of Fr <<11 ria ve&ca, with some
sub- varieties, had been produced. At the present day the varieties
of the several species are almost innumerable. The species consist
of, firstly, the wood or Alpine cultivated strawberries, descended
from Ft a native of Europe and of North America. There
are eight wild European varieties, as ranked by Duchesne, of
F. vesca, but several of these are considered species by some
botanists. Secondly, the green stra^vberries, descended from the
European F. colina, and little cultivated in England. Thirdly,
the Hautbois, from the European F. elntior. Fourthly, the Scarlets,
descended from F. Virginian' t, a native of the whole breadth of
North America. Fifthly, the Chili, descended from F. chi/oensis,
an inhabitant ot the west coast of the temperate parts both of
North and South America. Lastly, the pines or Carolinas (including
the old Blacks), which have been ranked by most authors under
the name of F. grandiflora as a distinct species, said to inhabit
Surinam ; but this is a manifest error. This form is considered
by the highest authority, M. Gay, to be merely a strongly marked
race of F. chiloensisF^ These five or six forms have been ranked
by most botanists as specifically distinct ; but this may be doubted,
for Andrew Knight,^®^ who raised no less than 400 crossed strawy-
berries, asserts that the F. virginiana, chiloensis and grandiflora
may be made to breed together indiscriminately,” and he found,
in accordance with the principle of analogous variation, 'Hhat
similiar varieties could be obtained from the seeds of any one of
them.”
Since Knight’s time there is abundant and additional evidence
of the extent to which the American forms spontaneously cross.
We owe indeed to such crosses most of our choicest existing
Most of the largest cultivated
strawberries are the descendants of F.
grandiflora or chiloensis, and I have
Been no account of these f )rms in
their wild state. Methuen’s Scarlet
(Downing, ‘ Fruits,’ p. 527) has
“ immense fruit of the largest size,’’ •
and belongs to the section descended
from F. vitginiana : and the fruit of
this species, as 1 hear from Prof. A.
Gray, is only a little larger thaa that
of F. vesca, or our common wood-
strawberry.
‘ Le Kraisiei',’ par le Comte L. de
Lambertye, 1864, p. 50.
‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. iii.
1820, p. 207.
See an account by Prof. Decaisne,
and by others in ‘ Gardener’s Chron-
icle,’ 1862, p 335, and 1858, p. 172;
and Mr. Barnet’s paper in ‘ Hort
Soc. Transact.,’ vol. vi. 1826, p 170.
374
FRUITS :
Chap. X.
varieties. Knjc;lit did not succeed in crossing the European wood-
strawberry with the American Scarlet or with the Hautbois.
Mr. Williams of Pitmaston, however, succeeded ; but the hybrid
offspring from the Hautbois, though fruiting well, never produced
seed, with the exception of a single one, Avhich reproduced the
parent hybrid form.^°^ Major R. Trevor Clarke informs me that
he crossed two members of the Pine class (Myatt’s B. Queen and
Keen's Seedling) with the wood and hautbois, and that in each
case he raised only a single seedling; one of these fruited, but
was almost barren. Mr. W. Smith, of York, has raised similar
hybrids with equally poor success.^®'' We thus see^°® that the
European and American species can with some difficulty be crossed;
but it is improbable that hybrids sufficiently fertile to be worth
cultivation will ever be thus produced. 'J'his fact is surprising,
as these forms structurally are not widely dis1i net, and are some-
times connected in the districts where they grow wild, as I hear
from Professor Asa Gray, by puzzling intermediate forms.
The energetic culture of the Strawberry is of recent date, and
the cultivated varieties can in most cases be classed under some
one of the above native stocks. As the American strawberries
cross so freely and spontaneously, we can hardly doubt that they
will ultimately become inextricably confused. We find, indeed,
that horticulturists at present disagree under which class to rank
some few of the varieties; and a writer in the ‘Bon Jardinier’
of 1840 remarks that formerly it was possible to class all of them
under some one species, but that now this is quite impossible with
the American forms, the new English varieties having completely
tilled up the gaps between them.^°^ The blending together of two
or more aboriginal forms, which there is every reason to believe
has occurred with some of our anciently cultivated productions,
we see now actually occurring with our strawberries.
The cultivated species offer some variations worth notice. The
Black Prince, a seedling from Keen's Imperial (this latter being
a seedling of a very white strawberry, the white Carolina), is
remarkable from “ its peculiar dark and polished surface, and
from presenting an appearance entirely unlike that of any other
kind.’‘^“® Although the fruit in the different varieties differs so
greatly in form, size, colour, and quality, the so-called seed (which
corresponds with the whole fruit in the plum) with the exception
of being more or less deeply embedded in the pulp, is, according
to De Jonghe,^°^ absolutely the same in all : and this no doubt
Transact. Hort. Soc./ vol. v.
1824, p. 294.
‘ Journal of Horticulture,’ Dec.
30th, 1862, p. 779. See also Mr.
Prince to the same effect, ibid., 1863,
p. 418.
For additional evidence see
‘ Journal of Horticultxire,’ Dec. 9th,
1862, p. 721.
‘ Le Fraisier,’ par le Comte Le
de Lambertye, pp. 221, 230.
108 t Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. vi
p. 200.
‘ Gardenei'’s Chron.,’ 1858, p
173.
Chap. X.
STRAWBERRIES.
37-J
may be accounted for by the seed being of no value, and conse-
quently not having been subjected to selection. The strawberry
is properly three- leaved, but in 1761 Duchesne raised a single-
leaved variety of the European wood-strawberry, which Linnaeus
doubtfully raised to the rank of a species. Seedlings of this
variety, like those of most varietie-; not fixed by long-continued
selection, often revert to the ordinary form, or present intermediate
states.^^“ A variety raised by Mr. Myatt,^^^ apparently belonging
to one of the American forms presents a variation of an opposite
nature, for it has five leaves ; Godron and Lambertye also mentio'h
a five-leaved variety of F. colUna.
The Eed Bush Alpine strawberry (one of the F. vesai section)
does not produce stolons or runners, and this remarkable deviation
of structure is reproduced truly by seed. Another sub-variety,
the White Bush Alpine^ is similarly characterised, but when pro-
pagated by seed it often degenerates and produces plants with
runners.^^^ A strawberry of the American Pine section is also said
to make but few runners.^^'"^
Much has been written on the sexes of strawberries ; the tree
Hautbois properly bears the male and female organs on separate
plants,^^* and was consequently named by Duchesne dioica ; but
it frequently produces hermaphrodites; and Bindley by pro-
pagating such plants by runners, at the same time destroying
the males, soon raised a self-prolific stock. The other species
often showed a tendency towards an imperfect separation of the
sexes, as I have noticed with plants forced in a hot-house. Several
English varieties, which in this country are free from any such
tendency, when cultivated in rich soils under tlie climate of North
America commonly produce plants with separate sexes. Thus
a whole acre of Keen's Seedlings in the United States has been
observed to be almost sterile from the absence of male flowers ;
but the more general rule is, that the male plants overrun the
females. Some members of the Cincinnati Horticultural Society,
especially appointed to investigate this subject, report that “ few
varieties have the flowers perfect in both sexual organs,” Ac. The
most successful cultivators in Ohio plant for every seven row^s
of “ pistillata,” or female plants, one row of hermaphrodites, which
afford pollen for both kinds; but the hermaphrodites, owing to
their expenditure in the production of pollen, bear less fruit than
the female plants.
The varieties differ in constitution. Some of our best Engli^ h
Godron, ‘De I'Espfece,’ tom. i. p.
161.
‘Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1851, p.
4-40.
F. Gloede in ‘ Gardener's Chron.,’
18S2, p. 1053.
Downing's ‘Fruits,’ p. 532.
Barnet, in ‘ Hort. Transact.,’
vol. vi. p. 210.
‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1847, p.
539.
For the several statements with
respect to the American strawberries,
see Downing, ‘Fruits,* p. 524; ‘Gar-
dener’s Chronicle,’ 1843, p. 188 ; 1847
p. 539; 1861, p. 717.
376
FRUITS :
Chap, X.
kinds, such as Keen’s Seedlings, are too tender for certain parts
of North America, where other English and many American
varieties succeed perfectly. That splendid fruit, the British Queen,
can be cultivated but in few places either in EnglancV or France :
but this apparently depends more on the nature of the soil than
on the climate; a famous gardener says that “no mortal could
grow the British Queen at Slirubland Park unless the whole nature
of the soil was altered.”^^'^ La Constantine is one of the hardiest
kinds, and can withstand Russian winters, but it is easily burnt
by the sun, so that it will not succeed in certain soils either in
England or the United States.^^® The Filbert Pine Strawberry
“requires more water than any other variety; and if the plants
once suffer from drought, they will do little or no good afterwards.”
CuthiH’s Black Prince Strawberry evinces a singular tendency
to mildew ; no less than six cases have been recorded of thisj variety
suffering severely, whilst other varieties growing close by, and
treated in exactly the same manner, were not at all infested by
this fiingusd^*^ The time of maturity differs much in the different
varieties : some belonging to the wood or alpine section produce
a succession of crops throughout the summer.
iioo^.eberry (liibes grossulariu). — No one, I believe, has hitherto
doubted that all the cultivated kinds are sprung from the wild
plant bearing this name, which is common in Central and Northern
Europe ; therefore it will be desirable briefly to specify all the
points, though not very important, which have varied. If it be
admitted that these differences are due to culture, authors perhaps
will not be so ready to assume the existence of a large number
of unknown wild parent-stocks for our other cultivated plants.
The gooseberry is not alluded to by writers of the classical period.
Turner mentions it in 1578, and Parkinson specifies eight varieties
in 1629 ; the Catalogue of the Horticultural Society for 1812 gives
149 varieties, and the lists of the Lancashire nurseymen are said
to include above 300 names,^^^ In the " Gooseberry Grower's
Register ’ for 1862 I find that 248 distinct varieties have won prizes
at various periods, so that a vast number must have been exhibited.
No doubt the difference between many of the varieties is very
small ; but Mr. Thompson in classifying the fruit for the Horti-
cultural Society found less confusion in the nomenclature of the
gooseberry than of any other fruit, and he attributes this “ to the
great interest which the prize-growers have taken in detecting
Mi\ D. Beaton, in ‘ Cottage
Gardt^ner,’ 1860, p. 86. See also
Cottage Gardener,’ 1855, p. 88, and
many other authorities. For the
Continent, see F. Gloede, in ‘ Gar-
dener’s Chronicle,’ 1862, p. 1053.
“8 Rer. W. F. Radclyffe, in ‘Jour-
nal of Hort.,’ March 14, 1865, p.
207.
jVIr. H. Doubleday ii* *Gardorier’d
Chron.,’ 1862, p. 110,1.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1854, p.
254.
Loudon’s ‘ Kncyclop. of Garden-
ing,’ p. 930; and Alph. Dc Candtlle,
‘ Gtograph. Bot.,’ p. 910.
Chap. X. THE GOOSEBERRY. 377
Borts with wrong names/’ and this shows that all the kindSj
numerous as they are, can be recognised with certainty.
The bushes differ in their manner of growth, being erect, or
spreading, or pendulous. The periods of leafing and flowering
differ both absolutely and relatively to each other thus the White
smith produces early flowers, which from not being protected
by the foliage, as it is believed, continually fail to produce fruit.
The leaves vary in size, tint, and in dej)th of lobes ; they are
smooth, downy, or hairy on the upper surface. Th^3 branches
are more or less downy or spinose ; the Hedgehog has probably
derived its name from the singular bristly condition of its shoots
and fruit.” The branches of the wild gooseberry, 1 may remark,
are smooth, with the exception of thorns at the bases of the buds.
The thorns themselves are either very small, few and single, or
very large and triple ; they are sometimes reflexed and much
dilated at their bases. In the different varieties the fruit varies
in abundance, in the period of maturity, in hanging until shrivelled,
and greatly in size, “ some sorts having their fruit large during
a very early period of growth, whilst others are small, until nearly
ripe.” The fruit varies also much in colour, being red, yellow,
green, and white — the pulp of one dark-red gooseberry being-
tinged with yellow; in flavour; in being smooth or downy, — few,
however, of the Eed gooseberries, whilst many of the so-called
Whites, are downy ; or in being so spinose that one kind is called
Henderson’s Porcupine. Two kinds acquire when mature a powdery
bloom on their fruit. The fruit varies in the thickness and vein-
ing of the skin, and, lastly, in shape, being spherical, oblong, oval,
or obovate.^^^
I cultivated fifty-four varieties, and, considering how greatly the
fruit jdiffers, it was curious how closely similar the flowers were in
all these kinds. In only a few I detected a trace of difference in the
size or colour of the corolla. The calyx differed in a rather greater
degree, for in some kinds it was much redder than in others; and
in one smooth white gooseberry it was unusually red. The calyx
also differed in the basal part being smooth or woolly, or covered
with glandular hairs. It deserves notice, as being contrary to what
might have been expected from the law of correlation, that a
smooth red gooseberry had a remarkably hairy calyx. The flowers
of the Sportsman are furnished with very large coloured bracteffi ;
and this is the most singular deviation of structure which I have
observed. These same flowers also varied much in the number of
the petals, and occasionally in the number of the stamens and
pistils ; so that they were semi-monstrous in structure, yet they
produced plenty of fruit. Mr. Thompson remarks that in tho
Loudon’s ‘ Gardener's Magazine,’
vol. i\^ 18-28, p. 112.
The fullest account of the goose-
berry Is given by Mr. Thompson in
‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. i., 2nd
series, 1835, p. 218, from which
most of the ioregeing facts are taken.
378
FRUITS :
Chap. X,
Pastime gooseberry extra bracts are often attached to the sides ol
the fruit.”
The most interesting point in tlie history of the gooseberry is the
steady increase in the size of the fruit. Manchester is the metro-
])olis of the fanciers, and prizes from five shillings to five or ten
pounds are yearly given for the heaviest fruit. The ‘ Gooseberry
Grower's Register’ is published annually ; the earliest known coj)y
is dated 1786, but it is certain that meetings for the adjudication of
prizes were held some years previously.^^ The ‘ Register ’ for 1845
gives an account of 171 Gooseberry Shows, held in different places
during that year ; and this fact shows on how large a scale the
culture has been carried on. The fruit of the wild gooseberry is
said to weigh about a quarter of an ounce or 5 dwts , that is, 120
grains ; about the year 1786 gooseberries were exhibited weighing
10 dwts., so that the weight was then doubled; in 1817 26 dwts. 17
grs. was attained ; there was no advance till 1825, when 31 dwts.
16 grs. was reached ; in 1830 ‘‘ Teazer ” weighed 32 dwts. 13 grs. ;
in 1841 “ Wonderful” weighed 32 dwts. 16 grs. ; in 1844 '‘London”
weighed 35 dwts. 12 grs., and in the following year 36 dwts. 16
grs ; and in 1852, in Staffordshire, the fruit of the same variety
j-eached the astonishing weight of 37 dwts. 7 grs.,’-^ or 896 grs. ;
that is, between seven or eight times the weight of the wild fruit.
1 hnd that a small apple, 65 inches in circumference, has exactly
this same weight. The “ London” gooseberry (which in 1852 had
altogether gained 333 prizes) has, up to the present year of 1875,
never reached a greater weight than that attained in 1852. Perhaps
the fruit of the gooseberry has now reached the greatest possible
weight, unless in the course of time some new and distinct variety
shall arise.
This gradual, and on the whole steady increase of weight from
the latter part of the last century to the year 1852, is probably in
large part due to improved methods of cultivation, for extreme care
is now taken ; the branches and roots are trained, composts are
made, the soil is mulched, and only a few berries are left on each
bush ; but the increase no doubt is in main part due to the con-
tinued selection of seedlings which have been found to be more and
more capable of yielding such extraordinary fruit. Assuredly the
“ Highwayman” in 1817 could not have produced fruit like that of
the “Roaring Lion'’ in 1825; nor could the “Roaring Lion,” though
it was grown by many persons in many places, gain the supreme
triumph achieved in 1852 by the “ London ” Gooseberry.
‘ Catalogue of Fruits of Hort.
Soc. Garden,’ 3rd edit. 184-2.
125 jyjj_ Clarkson, of Manchester, on
the Culture of the Gooseberry, in
Loudon’s ‘ Gardener’s Magazine,’ vol.
iv. 1828, p. 482.
‘2® Downing’s ‘ Fruits of America,’
p. 213.
‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1844, p.
811, where a table is given ; ami 1845,
p. 819. For the extreme weights
gained, ‘ Jourua/ of Horticulture,’
July 26, 1864, p. 61.
*28 Mr. Saul, of Lancaster, in Lou-
don’s ‘Gardener’s Mag.,’ vol. ill. 1828
p. 421 ; and vol. x. 1834. p. 42.
Chap.. X.
WALNUT.
379
Walnut {Jiiglans regia). — This tree and the common niit belong
to a widely different order from the foregoing fruits, and are there-
fore here noticed. The walnut grows wild on the Caucasus and in
the Himalaya, where Dr. Hooker found the fruit of full size, but
‘‘as hard as a hickory-nut.” It has been found fossil, as M. de
Saporta informs me, in the tertiary formation, of France.
In England the walnut presents considerable differences, in the
shape and size of the fruit, in the thickness of the husk, and in the
thinness of the shell ; this latter quality has given rise to a variety
called the thin-shelled, which is valuable, but suffers from the
attacks of tit-mice.^^*^ The degree to which the kernel tills the
shell varies much. In France there is a variety called the Grape
or cluster- walnut, in which the nuts grow in “bunches of ten,
fifteen, or even twenty together.” There is another variety which
bears on the saipe tree differently shaped leaves, like the hetero-
phyllous hornbeam; this tree is also remarkable from having
pendulous branches, and bearing elongated, large, thin-shelled
nuts.^^^ M. Cardan has minutely described some siugular physi-
ological peculiarities in the June-leating variety, which produces
its leaves and flowers four or five weeks later than the common
varieties ; and although in August it is apparently in exactly the
same state of forwardness as the other kinds, it retains its leaves and
fruit much later in the autumn. These constitutional peculiarities
are strictly inherited. Lastly, walnut-trees, which are properly
monoicous, sometimes entirely fail to produce male flowersd^
Nuts {(Jorytufi avellana). — Most botanists rank all the varieties
under the same species, the common wild nut.^^^ The husk, or
involucre, differs greatly, being exti-emely short in Barr’s Spanish,
and extremely long in filberts, in which it is contracted so as to
prevent the nut falling out. This kind of husk also protects the
nut from birds, for titmice {Purus) have been observed to pass
over filberts, and attack cobs and common nuts growing in the
same orchard. In the purple-filbert the husk is purple, and in the
frizzled-filbert it is curiously laciniated; in the red-filbert the
pellicle of the kernel is red. The shell is thick in some varieties,
but is thin in Cosfbrd’s-nut, and in one variety is of a bluish colour.
The nut itself differs much in size and shape, being ovate and
compressed in filberts, nearly round and of great size in cobs and
’2* ‘ Himalayan Journals,’ 1854,
vol. ii. p. 334. Moorcroft (‘Travels,’
vol. ii. p. 146) describes four varieties
cultivated in Kashmir.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1850,
p. 723.
Paper translated in Loudon’s
‘Gardener’s Mag.,’ 1829, vol. v. p,
202.
Quoted in ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’
1849, p. 101.
‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 18475
pp. 541 and 558.
The following details are taken
from the ‘Catalogue of Fruits, 1842,
in Garden of Hort. Soc.,’ p. 103 ; and
from Loudon’s ‘ Encyclop. of Garden-
ing,’ p. 943.
‘Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1860, p
95G.
380
CUCURBIT AOEO us PLANTS.
Chap. X.
Spanish nuts, oblong and longitudinally striated in Cosford’s, and
obiusely four-sided in the Downton Square nut.
CumrbUaceous pl(i7its. — These plants have been for a long period
the opprobrium of botanists; numerous varieties have been ranked
as si)ecies, and, what happens more rarely, forms which now must
be considered as species have been classed as varieties. Owing to
the admirable experimental researches of a distinguished botanist,
M. Naudin,^^® a flood of light has recently been thrown on this
group of plants. M. Naudin, during many years, observed and
experimented on above 1200 living specimens, collected from all
quarters of the world. Six species are now recognised in the genus
Cucurbita ; but three alone have been cultivated and concern us,
namely, C. maxima and pepo, which include all pumpkins, gourds,
squashes, and the vegetal3le marrow, and C. moschuta. These three
species are not known in a wild state ; but Asa Gray gives good
reason for believing that some pumpkins are natives of N. America.
These three species are closely allied, and have the same general
habit, but their innumerable varieties can always be distinguished,
according to Naudin, by certain almost fixed characters ; and what
is still more important, when crossed they yield no seed, or only
sterile seed ; whilst the varieties spontaneously intercross with the
utmost freedom. Naudin insists strongly (p. 15), that, though
these three species have varied greatly in many characters, yet it
has been in so closely an analogous manner that the varieties can
be arranged in almost parallel series, as we have seen with the
forms of wheat, with the two main races of the peach, and in other
cases. Though some of the varieties are inconstant in character,
yet others, when grown separately under uniform conditions of life,
are, as Naudin repeatedly (pp. 6. 16, 35) urges, “ douees d une
stabilite presqne comparable a celle des especes les mieux caracte-
risees.'^ One variety, I’Orangin (pp. 43, 63), has such prepotency in
transmitting its character, that when crossed with other varieties a
vast majority of the seedlings come true. Naudin, referring (p. 47)
to C. pepo, says that its races “ ne different des especes veritables
qu’en ce qu’elles peuvent s’allier les unes aux autres par voie
d’hybridite, sans que leur descendance perde la faculte de se
perpetuer.’’ If we were to trust to external differences alone, and
give up the test of sterility, a multitude of species, would have to
be formed out of the varieties of these three species of Cucurbita.
Many naturalists at the present day lay far too little stress, in my
opinion, on the test of sterility; yet it is not improbable that
distinct species of plants after a long course of cultivation and
variation may have their mutual sterility eliminated, as we have
every reason to believe has occurred with domesticated animals.
Nor, in the case of plants under cultivation, should we be justified
‘ Annales des Sc. Nat. Bot.’ 4th ‘American Journ. of Science,
series, vol. vi. 1856, p. 5. 2ud ser. vol. xxiv. 1857, p. 442.
Chap. X.
CUCUKBITACEOUS PLANTS.
381
in assuming that varieties never acquire a slight degree of mutual
sterility, as we sTiall more fully see in a future chapter when certain
facts are given on the high authority of Gartner and Kolreuter.^^*
The forms of C. jpepo are classed by Naudin under seven sections,
each including subordinate varieties. He considers this plant
as probably the most variable in the world. The fruit of one
variety (pp. 33, 46) exceeds in value that of another by more than
two thousand fold! When the fruit is of very large size, the
number produced is few (p. 45) ; when of small size, many are
produced. No less astonishing (p. 33) is the variation in the shape
of the fruit, the typical form apparently is egg-like, but this
.becomes either drawn out into a cylinder, or shortened into a flat
disc. We have also an almost infinite diversity in the colour and
state of surface of the fruit, in the hardness both of the shell and of
the flesh, and in the taste of the flesh, whi.di is either extremely
sweet, faiinaceous, or slightly bitter. The seeds also differ in a
slight degree in shape, and wonderfully in size (p. 34), namely,
from six or seven to more than twenty-five millimetres in length.
In the varieties which grow upright or do not run and climb,
the tendrils, though useless (p. 31), are either present or are repre-
sented by various semi-monstrous organs, or are quite absent. The
tendrils are even absent in some running varieties in which the
stems are much elongated. It is a singular fact that (p. 31) in all
the varieties with dwarfed stems, the leaves closely resemble each
( ther in shape.
Those naturalists who believe in the immutability of species
often maintain that, even in the most variable forms, the
characters which they consider of specific value are unchange-
able. To give an example from a conscientious writer,^^^
who, relying on the labours of M. Naudin, and referring to
the species of fiucurbita, says, “ au milieu de toutes les varia-
tions du fruit, lestiges, les feuilles, lescalices, les corolles, les
etamines restent invariables dans chacune d’elles.” Yet M.
Naudin, in describing Cucurhita pepo (p. 30), says, “ Ici,
d’ailleurs, ce ne sont pas seulement les fruits qui varient, c'est
aussi le feuillage et tout le port de la plante. Neanmoins, je
crois qn’on la distinguera toujours facilement des deux autres
especes, si ^Ton veut ne pas perdre de vue les caracteres
Gartner, ‘ Bastarderzeugung,’
1849, s. 87, and s. 169 with respect
to Maize; on V^rbascum, ibid., ss. 92
and 181 ; also his ‘ Kenntniss der Be-
fruchtuug,” s. 137. With respect to
Nicotiana, see Kolreuter, ‘Zweite
Forts.,’ 1764, s. 53 ; though this is a
somewhat diiferent case.
139 i j)g I’Espece,’ par M. Godron,
tom. ii. p. 64.
382
CUCURBITAOEOUS PLANTS.
Chap. X.
dilterentiels qne jo m’efforce de faire reseortir. Cea
paracteres sont quelquefois pen marques : il arrive momc quo
plus i ours d’eiitre eux s’ctfacent presciue entierement, mais ii on
reste toujours quelques-uns qui remettont I’observateur sur la
voio.” Now let it bo noted wliat a difference, with regard to
the immutability of the so-called specific characters this
paragraph pi'oduces on the mind, from that above quoted from
M. Godron.
I will add another remark : naturalists continually assert
that no important organ varies ; but in saying this they
unconsciously argue in a vicious cii'cle ; for if an organ, let it
be what it may, is highly variable, it is regarded as un-
important, and under a systematic point of view tins is quite
correct. But as long as constancy is thus taken as the
criterion of importance, it will indeed be long before an
important organ can be shown to be inconstant. The enlarged
form of the stigmas, and their sessile position on the summit
of the ovary, must be considered as important characters, and
were used by Gasparini to separate certain pumpkins as a
distinct genus ; but Naudin says (p. 20), these parts have no
constancy, and in the flowers of the Turban varieties of C.
maxima they sometimes resume their ordinary structure.
Again, in G. maxima, the carpels (p. 19) which form the
turban project even as much as two-thirds of their lengtli
out of the receptacle, and this latter part is thus reduced to a
sort of platform ; but this remarkable structure occurs only
in certain varieties, and graduates into the common form in
which the carpels are almost entirely enveloped within the
recejDtacle. In C. moscliata the ovarium (p. 50) varies greatly
in shape, being oval, nearly spherical, or cylindrical, more
or less swollen in the upper part, or constricted round the
middle, and either straight or curved. "When the ovarium is
short and oval the interior structure does not differ from that
of C maxima and pepo, but when it is elongated t]ie carpels
occupy only the terminal and swollen portion. I may add
that in one variety of the cucumber {Cucumis sativus') the
fruit regularly contains five carpels instead of three. I
Naudin, in ■ Annal. de-s Sc. Nat.,’ 4th ser. Bot. tom. xi. 1859, p. 28.
Ceiap. X.
CrCURBTTACEOUS PLANTS.
?>83
presume that it will not be disputed that we here liaYO
instances of great variability in organs of the highest
physiological importance, and with most plants of the highest
classificatory importance.
Sageret^^^ and Naiidin found that the cucumber {O. sativtis)
could not be crossed with any other species of the genus ; therefore
no doubt it is specifically distinct from the melori._ This will
appear to most persons a superfluous statement; yet we hear from
Naudin^^^ that there is a race of melons, in which the fruit is
so like that of the cucumber, “ both externally and internally, that
it is hardly possible to distinguish the one from the other except
by the leaves.” The varieties of the melon seem to be endless,
for Nandin after six years’ study had not come to the end of them ;
he divides them into ten sections, including numerous sub- varieties
which all intercross with perfect ease.^^^ Of the forms considered
by Naudin to be varieties, botanists have made thirty distinct
species ! “ and they had not the slightest acquaintance with the
multitude of new forms which have appeared since their time.”
Nor is the creation of so many species at all surprising when we
consider how strictly their characters are transmitted by seed,
and how wonderfully they differ in appearance : ‘‘ Mira est qnideni
foliorum et habitus diversitas, sed multo magis fructuum,” says
Naudin. The fruit is the valuable part, and this, in accordance
with the common rule, is the most modified part. Some melons
are only as large as small plums, others weigh as much as sixty-six
pounds. One' variety has a scarlet fruit ! Another is not more
than an inch in diameter, but sometimes more than a yard in
length, twisting about in all directions like a serpent.” It is
a singular fact that in this latter variety many parts of the plant,
namely, the stems, the footstalks of the female flowers, the middle
lobe of the leaves, and especially the ovarium, as well as the mature
fruit, all show a strong tendency to become elongated. Several
varieties of the melon are interesting from assuming the charateristic
features of distinct species and even of distinct though allied
genera : thus the serpent-melon has some resemblance to the fruit
of Trichosardhes anguina ; we have seen that other varieties closely
resemble cucumbers; some Egyptian varieties have their seeds
attached to a portion of the pulp, and this is characteristic of
certain wild forms. Lastly, a variety of melon from Algiers is
‘ M^moire sur les Cucurbitacees,’
1826, pp. 6, 24.
142 4 p]ore des Serres,’ Oct. 1861,
quoted in ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’
1861, p. 1 135. I have often consulted
and taken some facts from M. Naudin’s
Memoir on Cucumis in ‘ Annal. des Sc.
Nat.,’ 4th series, Bot. tom. xi. 1859,
p. 5;
See also Sagoret’s ‘ Memoire/
p. 7.
384
TRKES :
CUAP X.
romarkable from announcing its maturity by a spontaneous
and almost sudden dislocation/’ when deep cracks suddenly appear,
and the fruit falls to pieces; and this occurs with the wild 0. momor-
dica. Finally, M. Naudin well remarks that this “extraordinary
production of races and varieties by a single species and their
pei-manence when not interfered with by crossing, are phenomena
^v'cll calculated to cause reflection.”
Useful aitd Ornamental Trees.
Trees deserve a passing notice on account of the numerous varieties
which they present, differing in their precocity, in their manner of
growth, their foliage, and bark. Thus of the common ash (Fraxlniis
excelsior') the catalogue of Messrs. Lawson of Edinburgh includes
twenty-one varieties, some of which differ much in their, bark;
there is a yellow, a streaked reddish-white, a purple, a wart-barked
and a fungous-barked variety.^^^ Of hollies no less than eighty-four
varieties are grown alongside each other in Mr. Paul’s nursery.’'*^
In the case of trees, all the recorded varieties, as far as I can find
out, have been suddenly produced by one single act of variation.
The length of time required to raise many generations, and the little
value set on the fanciful varieties, explains how it is that successive
modifications have not been accumulated by selection ; hence,
also, it follows that we do not here meet with sub- varieties subor-
dinate to varieties, and these again subordinate to higher groups.
On the Continent, however, where the forests are more carefully
attended to than in England, Alph. De Candolle says that there
is not a forester who does not search for seeds from that variety
which he esteems the most valuable.
Our useful trees have seldom been exposed to any great change
of conditions; they have not been richly manured, and the English
kinds grow under their proper climate. Yet in examining extensive
beds of seedlings in nursery-gardens considerable differences may
be generally observed in them; and whilst touring in England
I have been surprised at the amount of difference in the appearance
of the same species in our hedgerows and woods. But as plants
vary so much in a truly wild state, it would be difficult for even
a skilful botanist to pronounce wliether, as I believe to be the
case, hedgerow trees vary more than those growing in a primeval
forest. Trees when planted by man in woods or hedges do not
grow whore they would naturally be able to hold their place
against a host of competitors, and are therefore exposed to conditions
not strictly natural : even this slight change would probably suffice
to cause seedlings raised from such trees to be variable. Whether
or not our half-v/ild English trees, as a general rule, are more
Loudon’s ‘ Arboretuin et Fvuti- 1096.
cetum,’ vol. ii. p. 1217. ‘ Geograph. Bot./ p. 1096.
• Gai’dener’.s Chronicle/ 1866, p.
Chap, X.
TKEES,
385
variable than trees growing in their laative forests, there can hardly
be a doubt that they liave yielded a greater number of strongly-
marked and singular variations of structure.
In manner of growth, we have weeping or pendulous varieties
of the v/illow, ash, elm, oak, and yew, and other trees ; and this
weeping habit is sometimes inherited, though in a singularly
capricious manner. In the Lombardy poplar, and in certain
fastigiate or pyramidal varieties of thorns, junipers, oaks, &c., we
have an opposite kind of jjrowth. The Hessian oak,^^'^ which is
famous from its fastigiate habit and size, bears hardly any resem-
blance in general appearance to a common oak; ‘'its acorns are
not sure to produce plants of the same habit ; some, however, turn
out the same as the parent-tree.” Another fastigiate oak is said
to have been found wild in the Pyrenees, and this is a surprising
circumstance; it generally comes so true by seed, that Le Candolle
considered it as specifically distinct.^'^^ The fastigiate Juniper
(d. suecica) likewise transmits its character by seed.^'^® Dr. Falconer
informs me that in the Botanic Gardens at Calcutta the great heat
caused aj^ple-trees to become fastigiate ; and we thus see the same
result following from the effects of climate and from some unknown
cause.^"®
In foliage we have variegated leaves which are often inherited,
dark purple or red leaves, as in the hazel, barberry, and beech,
the colour in these two latter trees being sometimes strongly and
sometimes weakly inherited ; deeply-cut leaves; and leaves
covered with prickles, as in the variety of the holly well called
ferox, which is said to reproduce itself by seetl.^'® In fact, nearly
all the peculiar varieties evince a tendency, more or less strongly
marked, to reproduce themselves by seed.^^® This is to a certain
extent the case, according to Bosc/®^ with tlu’ee varieties of the
elm, namely, the broad-leafed, lime-leafed, and twisted elm, in which
latter the fibres of the wood are twisted. Even with the hetero-
phyllous hornbeam (Carpinm betuhis), which bears on each twig
leaves of two shapes, “ several plants raised from seed all retained
“the same peculiarity.”^^® I will add only one other remarkable
case of variation in foliage, namely, the occurrence of two sub-
varieties of the ash with simple instead of pinnated leaves, and
‘Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1842, p.
?'6.
Loudon’s ‘ Arboretum et Fruti-
cetum,’ vol. iii. p. 1731.
Ibid.,’ vol. iv. p. 2489.
Godron (‘ De I’Espece,’ tom. ii.
p. 91) describes four varieties of Ro-
binia remarkable from their manner
of growth.
‘Journal of a Horticultural
Tour, by Caledonian Hort. Soc.,’ 1823,
p. 107. Alph. De Candolle, ‘ Geo-
26
graph. Bot.,’ p. 1083. Verlot, ‘ S il-
ia Production des Variete's,’ 1865 ; p.
55 for the Barberry.
Loudon’s ‘ Arboretum et Fruti-
cetum,’ vol. ii. p. 508.
N’ei’iot, ‘ Des I’arieles,’ 1£S5,
p. 92.
Loudon’s ‘Arboretum et Fruti-
cetum,’ vol. iii. p. 1376.
‘Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1841
p. 687.
386
TKEES.
Chap. "X
which generally transmit their character by seed.^'’’® The occur-
rence, in trees belonging to widely different orders, of weeping
and fastigate varieties, and of trees bearing deeply cut, variegated,
and purple leaves, shows that these deviations of structure must
result from some very general physiological laws.
Differences in general appearance and foliage, not more strongly
marked than those above indicated, have led good observers to
rank as distinct species certain forms which are now known to be
mere varieties. Thus, a plane-tree long cultivated in England
was considered by almost every one as a North American species :
but is now ascertained by old records, as I am informed by Dr.
Hooker, to be a variety. So, again, the Thuja pendula or filiformh
was ranked by such good observers as Lambert, Wallich, and
others, as a true species ; but it is now known that the original
plants, five in number, suddenly appeared in a bed of seedlings,
raised at Mr. Loddige’s nursery, from T. orieutalis; and Dr. Hooker
has adduced excellent evidence that at Turin seeds of -^'. pendula
have reproduced the parent tbrm, T. orientalis}^'^
Every one must have noticed how certain individual trees regu-
larly put forth and shed their leaves earlier or later than others
of the same species. There is a famous horse-chesnut in the
Tuileries which is named from leafing so much earlier than the
others. There is also an oak near Edinburgh which retains its
leaves to a very late period. I'hese differences have been attributed
by some authors to the nature of the soil in which the trees gTOv\^ ;
but Archbishop Whately grafted an early thorn on a late one, and
vire versa, and both grafts kept to their proper periods, which
differed by about a fortnight, as if they still grew on their own
stocks.^^^ There is a Cornish variety of the elm which is almost
an evergreen, and is so tender that the shoots are often killed
by the frost; and the varieties of the Turkish oak {Q. cerris) may
be arranged as deciduous, sub-evergreen, and evergreen.^-®
Scotch Fir {Pinus sylvestris). — I allude to this tree as it bears on
the question of the greater variability of our hedgerow trees com-
pared with those under strictly natural conditions. A well-informed
writer states that the Scotch fir presents few varieties in its
native Scotch forests; but that it ‘‘varies much in figure and
“ foliage, and in the size, shape, and colour of its cones, when several
“ generations have been produced away from its native locality.”
There is little doubt that the highland and lowland varieties differ
in the value of their timber, and that they can be propagated truly
Godron, ‘ De I’Espece,’ tom. ii.
p. 89. Ill Loudon’s ‘ Gardener’s Mag.,’
vol. ’xii., 1836, p. 371, a variegate I
bushy ash is described and figured, as
having simple leaves ; it originated in
Ireland.
‘Gardener’- Chron.,’ 1863, p.
575.
Quoted from Royal Irish Aca-
demy in ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1841, p.
767.
Loudon’s ‘Arboretum et Kruti-
cetum for Elm, see vol. iii. p. 1376 ;
for Oak, p. 1846.
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 184 1, p.
822.
Chap. X.
TKEES.
387
hy seed ; thus justifying Loudon's remark, that “ a variety is often
of as much importance as a species, and sometimes far more so.”^®’
1 may mention one rather important point in which this tree occa-
sionally varies; in the classification of the Conifer?e, sections are
founded on whether two, three, or five leaves are included in the
same sheath; the Scotch fir has properly only two leaves thus
enclosed, but specimens have been observed with groups of three
leaves in a sheath/®^ Besides these differences in the somi-culti-
vated Scotch fir, there are in several parts of Europe natural or
geographical races, which have been ranked by some authors as
distinct species.^®^ Loudon considers F. pumHio, with its several
sub-varieties, as mughuH, nana, (fec.,which differ much when planted
in different soils, and only come “tolerably true from seed,” as
alpine varieties of the Scotch tir ; if this were proved to be the case,
it would be an interesting fact as showing that dwarfing from long
exposure to a severe climate is to a certain extent inherited.
The Hawthorn {(Jratoegus oxyacantha) has varied much. Besides
endless slighter variations in the form of the leaves, and in the size,
hardness, fleshiness, and shape of the berries, Loudon^®® enum.erates
twenty-nine well- marked varieties. Besides those cultivated for
their pretty flowers, there are others with golden-yellow, black, and
whitish berries; others with woolly berries, and others with re-
curved thorns. Loudon truly remarks that the chief reason why
the hawthorn has yielded more varieties than most other trees,
is that nurserymen select any remarkable v^ariety out of the
immense beds of seedlings which are annually raised for making
hedges. The flowers of the hawthorn usually include from one to
three pistils; but in two varietias, named inonoyyna and sihirica,
there is only a single pistil ; and d’Asso states that the common
thorn in Spain is constantly in this state.^®® There is also a variety
which is apetalous, or has its petals reduced to mere rudiments.
The famous Glastonbury thorn flowws and leafs towards the end of
December, at which time it bears berries produced from an earlier
crop of flowers. ^®'^ It is worth notice that several varieties of the
hawthorn, as well as of the lime and juniper, are very distinct in
their foliage and habit whilst young, but in the course of thirty or
forty years become extremely like each other ;’-®® thus reminding us
of the well-known fact that the deodar, the cedar of Lebanon, and
161 i Arboretum et Fruticetum,’
vol. iv. p. 2150.
‘Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1852, p.
()93.
See ‘ Beitrage zur Kenntniss .
Furopaischer Pinus-arten von Dr.
Christ.: Flora, 1864.’ He shows that
in the Ober-Engadin P. syhestris and
montana are connected by interme-
diate links.
16-* ‘Arboretum et Fruticetum/ rol.
iv. ])p. 2159 and 2189.
Ibid.,’ vol. ii. p. 830; Loudon’s
‘ Gardener’s Mag.,’ vol. vi. IS.'h), p.
714.
Loudon's ‘ Arboretum et Fru-
ticetum,’ vol. ii. p. 834.
Loudon’s ‘ Gardener’s Mag.,’ vrl.
ix. 1833, p. 123.
Ibid., vol. xi. 1835, p. 503.
3S8
FLOWEflS.
Chap, X,
that of the Atlas, are distinguished with the greatest case whilst
young, but with difficulty when old.
Floweks.
I SHALL not for several reasons treat the variability of plants which
are cultivated for their flowers alone at any great length. Many of
our favourite kinds in their present state are the descendants of
two or more species crossed and commingled together, and this
circumstance alone would render it difficult to detect the difference
due to variation. For instance, our Koses, Petunias, Calceolarias,
Fuchsias, Verbenas, Gladioli, Pelargoniums, &c,, certainly have had
a multiple origin. A botanist well acquainted with the parent-
forms would probably detect some curious structural differences in
their crossed and cultivated descendant; and he would certainly
observe many new and remarkable constitutional peculiarities. I
will give a few instances, all relating to the Pelargonium, and taken
chiefly from Mr. Beck,^“® a famous cultivator of this plant : some
varieties require more water thau others; some are “ very impatient
of the knife if too greedily used in making cuttiegs;” some, when
potted, scarcely show a root at the outside of the ball of the earth ;”
one variety requires a certain amount of confinement in the pot to
make it throv/- up a flower-stem ; some varieties bloom well at the
commencement of the season, others at the close ; one variety is
known,^'® which will stand “ even pine-apple top and bottom heat,
without looking any more drawn than if it had stood in a common
greenhouse ; and Blanche Fleur seems as if made on purpose for
growing in winter, like many bulbs, and to rest all summer.” These
odd constitutional peculiarities would enable a plant in a state of
nature to become adapted to widely different circumstances and
climates.
Flowers possess little interest under our present point of view,
because they have been almost exclusively attended to and selected
for their beautiful colour, size, perfect outline, and manner of
growth. In these particulars hardly one long-cultivated flower can
be named which has not varied greatly. What does a florist care
for the shape and structure of the organs of fructification, unless,
indeed, they add to the beauty of the flower ? When this is the
case, flow'ers become modified in important points; stamens and
pistils may be converted into petals, and additional petals may be
developed, as in all double flowers. The process of gradual selection
by which flowers have been rendered more and more double, each
step in the process of conversion being inherited, has been recorded
in several instances. In the so-called double flowers of the
Comjoositm, the corollas of the central florets are greatly modified,
find the modifications are likewise inherited. In the columbine
‘Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1845, p. dener,’ 1860, p. 377. See, also Mr.
523. Beck, on the habits of Queen Mab, in
D.' Beaton, in ‘Cottage Gar- ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1845, p. 226.
Chap. X.
FLOWERS.
389
{Aquilegla vulgarih) some of the stamens are converted into petals
having the shape of nectaries, one neatly fitting into the otlier ; but
in one variety they are converted into simple petals.^^^ In the hose
in hose ” primulse, the calyx becomes brightly coloured and enlarged
so as to resemble a corolla; and Mr. W. Wooler informs me that
this peculiarity is transmitted ; for he crossed a common polyanthus
with one having a coloured calyx, and some of the seedlings
inherited the colorrred calyx during at least six generations. In the
hcn-and- chicken” daisy the main flower is surrounded by a brood
of small flowers developed from buds in the axils of the scales of the in-
volucre. A wonderful poppy has been described, in which the stamens
are converted into pistils ; and so strictly was this peculiarity inherited
that, out of 154 seedlings, one alone reverted to the ordinary and
common type.^''^ Of the cock’s-comb {Celosia cristatd), which is an
annual, there are several races in which the flower-stem is wonder-
fully “fasciated” or compressed; and one has been exhibited
actually eighteen inches in breadth. Peloric races of Gloxinia
speciosa and Antirrhinum majus can be propagated by seed, and
they differ in a wonderful manner from the typical form both in
structure and appearance.
A much more remarkable modification has been recorded by Sir
William and Dr. Hooker in Begonia frigida. This plant properly
produces male and female flowers on the same fascicles ; and in the
female flowers the perianth is superior; but a plant at Kew pro-
duced, besides the ordinary flowers, others which graduated towards
a perfect hermaphrodite structure ; and in these flowers the perianth
was inferior. To show the importance of this modification under a
classificatory point of viev/, I may quote what Prof. Harvey says,
namely, that had it occurred in a state of nature, and had a
botanist collected a plant with such flowers, he would not only have
placed it in a distinct genus from Begonia, but would probably
have considered it as the type of a new natural order.” This modi-
fication cannot in one sense be considered as a monstrosity, for
analogous structures naturally occur in other orders, as with
Saxifragse and Aristolochiacese. The interest of the case is largely
added to by Mr. C. W. Crocker’s observation that seedlings from
the normal flowers produced plants which bore, in about the same
proportion as the parent-plant, hermaphrodite flowers having inferior
perianths. The hermaphrodite flowers fertilised with their own
pollen were sterile.
If florists had attended to, selected, and propagated by seed other
Moquin-Tandon, ‘ Elements de
Thatologie,’ 1841, p. 213.
Sea also ‘ Cottage Gardener,’
1860, p. 133.
Quoted by J\lph. de Candolle,
‘Bibl. Univ.,’ November 1862, p. 58.
Knight, ‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’
vol. iv. p. 322.
‘ Botanical Magazine,’ tab. 5160,
fig. 4; Dr. Hooker, in ‘Gardener’s
Chron.,’ 1860, p. 190; Prof. Harvey,
in ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,* 1860, p. 145 ;
Mr. Crocker, in ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’
1861, p. 1092.
390.
FLOWERS.
Ciup. X
modifications of structure besides tliose which arc beautiful, a liost
of curious varieties would certainly have been raised ; and they
would probably have transmitted their characters so truly that the
cultivator would have felt ap;grieved, as in the case of culinary
vegetables, if his whole bed had not presented a uniform appearance.
Florists have attended in some instances to the leaves of their plant,
and have thus produced the most elegant and symmetrical patterns
of white, red, and green, which, as in the case of the pelargonium,
are sometimes strictly inherited^ Any one who will habitually
examine highly-cultivated flowers in gardens and greenhouses will
observe numerous deviations in structure; but most of these must
be ranked as mere monstrosities, and are only so far interesting as
showing how plastic the organisation becomes under high cultiva-
tion. From this point of view such works as Professor Moquin-
Tandoifs " Teratologie’ are highly instructive.
Aase.s. — These flowers offer an instance of a number of forms
generally ranked as species, namely, 11. centifolia, (jallica, alba,
damascena, spif/osissima, hracteata, tndica, semperjlorens^ moHchata,
&.G., which have largely varied and been intercrossed. The genus
Rosa is a notoriously difficult one, and, though some of the above
forms are admitted by all botanists to be distinct species, others are
doubtful ; thus, with respect to the British forms, Babington makes
seventeen, and Bentham only five species. The hybrids from some
of the most distinct forms — for instance, from A. indica, fertilised
by the pollen oi' li. centifolia — produce an abundance of seed ; I
state this on the authority of Mr. Rivers,’''’^ from whose work 1 have
drawn most of the following statements. As almost all the aboriginal
forms brought from different countries have been crossed and re-
crossed, it is no wonder that Targioni-Tozzetti, in speaking of the
common roses of the Italian gardens, remarks that “ the native
country and precise form of the wild type of most of them are
involved in much uncertainty.”^^® Nevertheless, Mr. Rivers in re-
ferring to ii. indica (p. 68) says that the descendants of each group
may generally be recognized by a close observer. The same author
often speaks of roses as having been a little hybridised; but it is
evident that in very many cases the difterences due to variation
and to hybridisation can now only be conjecturally distinguished.
The species have varied both by seed and by bud ; such modified
buds being often called by gardeners sports. In the following
chapter I shall fully discuss this latter subject, and shall show that
bud-variations can be propagated not only by grafting and budding,,
but often by seed. Whenever a new rose appears wuth any
peculiar character, however produced, if it yields seed, Mr. Rivers
Alrh. de Candolle, ‘Geograph.
BoL,’ p. 1083; ‘Gardener’s Chron.’
1861, p. 433. The inheritance of the
white and golden zones in Pelargonium
largely depends on the nature of the
soil. See D. Beaton, in ‘ Journal of
Horticulture,’ 1861, ]>. 64.
‘Rose Amateur’s Guide,’ T.
Rivers, 1837, p. 21.
‘ Journal Hort. Soc.,’ voi. ix.,
1855, p. 182.
Oh^p. X.
FLOWERS.
391
(p. ±) fully expects it to become the parent-type of a new family.
The tendency to vary is so strong in some kinds, as in the Village
Maid (EiverS; p. 16), that when grown in different soils it varies so
much in colour that it has been thought to form several distinct
kinds; Altogether the number of kinds is very great : thus M.
riesportes, in his Ca talogue for 1829, enumerates 2562 as cultivated
in France ; but no doubt a large proportion of tliese are mereiy
nominal.
It would be useless to specify the many points of difiteienco
between the various kinds, but some constitutional peculiarities
may be mentioned. Several French roses (Rivers, p. 12) will not
succeed in England ; and an excellent horticulturist remarks,
that “ Even in the same garden you will find that a rose that will
do nothing under a south wall will do well under a north one.
That is the case with I'aul Joseph here. It grows strongly and
blooms beautifully close to a north wall. For three years seven
plants have done nothing under a south wall.” Many roses can be
forced, “ many are totally unfit for forcing, among which is General
Jacqueminot.”^®*^ From the effects of crossing and variation
Mr. Eivers enthusiastically anticipates (p. 87) that the day will
come when all our roses, oven moss-roses, will have evergreen
foliage, brilliant and fragrant flowers, and the habit of blooming
from June till November. ‘‘ A distant view this seems, but per-
severance in gardening will yet achieve wonders,” as assuredly it
has already achieved wonders.
It may be worth while briefly to give the well-known history of
one class of roses. In 1798 some wild Scotch roses (A. spinosissima)
were transplanted into a garden ; end one of these bore flowers
slightly tinged with red, from which a plant was raised with semi-
monstrous flowers, also tinged with red; seedlings from this flower
were semi-double, and by continued selection, in about nine or ten
years, eight sub-varieties were raised. In the course of -less than
twenty years these double Scotch roses had so much increased in
number and kind, that twenty- six well-marked varieties, classed in
eight sections, were described by Mr. Sabine. In 1841 it is said
that three hundred varieties could be procured in the nursery-
gardens near Glasgow ; and these are described as blush, crimson,
purple, red, marbled, two-coloured, white, and yellow, and as
differing much in the size and shape of the flower.
Pansy or Heartsease {Viola tricolor^ &c.). — The history of this
flovrer seems to be pretty well known ; it was grown in Evelyn s
garden in 1687 ; but the varieties were not attended to till 1810-1812,
when Lady Monke, together with Mr. Iiee, the well-known nursery-
The Rev. W. F. Eadclyffe, in
‘ Journal of Horticulture,’ March 14,
1865, p. 207.
180 ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1861, p.
181 Mr. Sabine, in ‘ Transact. Hort.
Soc.,’ vol. iv. p. 285.
182 ‘ An Encyclop. of Plants,’ by J.
C. Loudon, 1841, p. 443.
392
FL0WE1J8.
Chap. X.
man, energetically commenced tlieir culture; and in the course of
a few years twenty varieties could be purchased.^®^ At about the
game period, namely in 1813 or 1814, Lord Gambier collected some
wild plants, and his gardener, Mr. Thomson, cultivated them,
together with some common garden varieties, and soon effected a
great improvement. The first great change was the conversion of
the dark lines in the centre of tlie flower into a dark eye or centre,
which at that period had never been seen, but is now considered
one of the chief requisites of a first- rate flower. In 1835 a book
entirely devoted to this flower was published, and four hundred
named varieties were on sale. From these circumstances this plant
seemed to me worth studying, more especially from the great
contrast between the small, dull, elongated, irregular flowers of the
wild pansy, and the beautiful, flat, symmetrical, circular, velvet-
like flowers, more than two inches in diameter, magnificently and
variously coloured, which are exhibited at our shows. But when I
came to enquire more closely, I found that, though the varieties
were so modern, yet that much confusion and doubt prevailed
about their parentage. Florists believe that the varieties are
descended from several wild stocks, namely, V. tricolor, lutea,
(j an diflora, amcena, and altaica, more or less intercrossed. And
when I looked to botanical works to ascertain whether these forms
ought to be ranked as species, I found equal doubt and confusion.
Viola altaica seems to be a distinct form, but what part it has played
in the origin of our varieties I know not ; it is said to have been
crossed with V. lutea. Viola amoena'^^^ is now looked at by all
botanists as a natural variety of V. grandiflora ; and this and V.
sudetica have been proved to be identical with V. lutea. The latter
and V. tricolor (including its admitted variety V. arvensis) are
ranked as distinct species by Babington, and likewise by M. Gay,^*‘*
who has paid particular attention to the genus; but the specific
distinction between V. lutea and tricolor is chiefly grounded on the
one being strictly and the other not strictly perennial, as well as on
some other slight and unimportant differences in the form of the
stem and stipules. Bentham unites these two forms ; and a high
authority on such matters, Mr. H. C. Watson, says that, “ while
V. tricolor passes into V. arveims on the one side, it approximates
so much towards V. lutea and V. Gurtisii on the other side, that a
distinction becomes scarcely more easy between them.”
Hence, after having carefully compared numerous varieties, 1
Loudon’s ‘ Gardener’s Magazine,’
vol. xi. 18d5. p. 427 ; also ‘ Journal
of Horticulture,’ April 14, 18d3, p.
275.
Loudon’s ‘ Gardener’s Magazine,’
vol. viii. p. 575 : vol. ix. p. 689.
Sir J. E. Smith, ‘ English Flora,’
^ol. i. p. 306. H. C. Watson, ‘ Cybe'e
Britannlca,’ vol. i. 1847, p. 181.
Quoted from ‘Annales des Sci-
ences,’ in the Companion to the ‘hot.
Mag.,’ vol. i. 1835, p. 159.
‘Cybele Britannica,’ vol. i. p.
173. See also Dr. Herbert on the
changes of colour in transplanted spe-
cimens, and on the natural variations
of grandiflora, in ‘Transact. Hort
Soc.’ vol. iv. p. 19.
CiiAr. X-
FLOWEES.
gave lip the attempt as too difficult for any one except a professed
botanist. Most of the varieties present such inconstant characters,
that when grown in poor soil, or when flowering out of their proper
season, they produced differently coloured and much smaller
flowers. Cultivators speak of this or that kind as being remark-
ably constant or true; but by this they do not mean, as in other
cases, that the kind transmits its character by seed, but that the
individual plant does not change much under culture. The
principle of inheritance, however, does hold good to a certain exteut
even vdth the fleeting varieties of the Heartsease, for to gain good
sorts it is indispensable to sow the seed of good sorts. Neverthe-
less, in almost every large seed-bed a few almost wild seedlings
reappear through reversion. On comparing the choicest varieties
with the nearest allied wild forms, besides the difference in the
size, outline, and colour of the flowers, the leaves sonietimes
differ in shape, as does the calyx occasionally in the length and
breadth of the sepals. The differences in the form of the nectary
more especially deserve notice; because characters derived from
this organ have been much used in the discrimination of most of
the species of Viola. In a large number of flowers compared in
1842 I found that in the greater number the nectary was straight ;
in others the extremity was a little turned upwards, or downwards,
or inwards, so as to be completely hooked ; in others, instead of
being hooked, it was first turned rectangularly downwards, and
then backwards and upwards; in others, the extremity was con-
siderably enlarged ; and lastly, in some the basal part was depressed,
becoming, as usual, laterally compressed towards the extremity.
In a large number of flowers, on the other hand, examined by me
in 1856 from a nursery-garden in a different part of England, the
nectary hardly varied at all. Now M. Gay says that in certain
districts, especally in Auvergne, the nectary of the wild V. grandi-
flora varies in the manner just described. Must we conclude from
this that the cultivated varieties first mentioned were all descended
from V. grandifiora, and that the second lot, though having the
same general appearance, w^ere descended from V. tricolor, of which
the nectary, according to M. Gay, is subject to little variation ? Or
is it not more probable that both these wild forms would be found
under other conditions to vary in the same manner and degree,
thus showing that they ought not to be ranked as specifically
distinct ?
The Dahlia has been referred to by almost every author who has
written on the variation of plants, because it is believed that all the
varietk.'S are descended from a single species, and because all have
arisen since 1802 in France, and since 1804 in England.^®® Mr.
Sabine remarks that it seems as if some period of cultivation had
been required before the fixed qualities of the native plant gave
Salisbury, in ‘Transact. Hort. semi-double variety v/as produced in
Soc.,’ vol. i. 1812, pp. 84, 92. A Madrid in 1790.
394
FLOWERS.
Chat. X
way and began to sport into those changes which no\v so delight
^^g »is9 flowers have been greatly modified in shape from a
flat to a globular form. Anemone and ranuncnlus-like races/^^
which differ in the form and arrangement of the florets, have
arisen;. also dwarfed races, one of which is only eighteen inches in
Itcight. The seeds vary much iu size. The petals are uniformly
coloured or tipped or striped, and present an almost infinite
diversity of tints. Seedlings of fourteen different colours have
been raised from the same plant; yet, as Mr. Sabine has remarke ),
“many of the seedlings follow their parents in colour.” The period
of flowering has been considerably hastened, and this has probably
been effected by continued selection, Salisbury, writing 1808,
says that they then flowered from September to November ; in
1828 some new dwarf varieties began flowering in June;’®^ and
Mr. Grieve informs me that the dwarf purple Zelinda in his garden
is in full bloom by the middle of June and sometimes even earlier.
Slight constitutional differences have been observed between certain
varieties : thus, some kinds succeed much better in one part of
England than in another and it has been noticed that some
varieties require much more moisture than others.^®'^
Such flowers as the carnation, common tulip, and hyacinth, which
are believed to be descended, each from a single wild form, present
innumerable varieties, differing almost exclusively in the size, form,
and colour of tlie flowers. These and some other anciently culti-
vated iDlants which have been long propagated by offsets, pipings,
bulbs, &c., become so excessively variable, that almost each new
plant rai.'Cd from seed forms a new variety, “ all of which to
describe particularly,” as old Gerarde wrote in 1597, “ were to roll
Sisyphus’s stone, or to number the sands.”
J-lyaciiitli {Hyacinthus oriental is). — It may, however, be worth
while to give a short account of this plant, which was introduced
into England in 1596 from the Levaut.^®^ The petals of the original
flower, says Mr. Paul, were narrow, wrinkled, pointed, and of a
flimsy texture ; now they are broad, smooth, solid, and rounded.
The erectness, breadth, and length of the whole spike, and the size
of the flowers, have all increased. The colours have been intensified
and diversified. Gerarde, in 1597, enumerates four, and Parkinson,
189 t Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. iii.,
1820. p. 225.
Loudon’s ‘ Gardener’s Mag.,’ rol.
vi., 1830, p. 77.
Loudon’s ‘ Encyclop. of Garden-
ing,’ p. 1035.
192 k Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. i.
p. 91; and Loudon’s ‘Gardener’s
Mag.,’ vol. iii., 1828, p. 179.
Mr. Wildman, in ‘ Gardener’s
Chron.,’ 1843, p. 87. ‘ Cottage Gar-
dener,’ April 8, 185i3, p. 33.
M. Faivre has given . an inte-
resting account of the successive
variations of the Chinese primrose,
since its introduction into Europe
about the year 1820: ‘Revue des
Cours Scientitiqucs,’ June, 1SG9, p.
428.
The best and fullest account of
this plant which I have met with is
by a famous horticulturist, Mr. I’aul,
of Waltham, in the ‘Gardener’s
Chronicle,' 1864, p. 342;
CiiAr, X.
FLOWERS.
805
in 1629, eight varieties. Now the varieties are very numerous, and
they were still more numerous a century ago. Mr. Paul remarks
that it is interesting to compare the Hyacinths of 1629 with those
“ of 1864, and to mark the improvement. Two hundred and tliirty-
“ five years have elapsed since then, and this simple flower serves
“ well to illustrate the great fact that the original forms of nature
“ do not remain fixed and stationary, at least when brought under
“ cultivation While looking at the extremes, we must not, how-
“ ever, forget that there are intermediate stages which are for the
“ most part lost to us. Nature will sometimes indulge liehself
'' with a leap, but as a rule her march is slow’ and gradual.” He
adds that the cultivator should have ‘‘ in his mind an ideal of
“ beauty, for the realisation of which he works wdth head and
hand.” We thus see how clearly Mr. Paul, an eminently success-
ful cultivator of this flower, appreciates the action of methodical
selection.
In a curious and apparently trustworthy treatise, published at
Amsterdam in 1768, it is stated that nearly 2,000 sorts were then
known ; but in 1864 Mr. Paul found only 700 in the largest garden
at Haarlem. In this treatise it is said that not an instance is
knowm of any one variety reproducing itself truly ‘by seed: the
wdiite kinds, however, now ^^' almost always yield white hyacinths,
and the yellow kinds come nearly true. The hyacinth is remark-
able from having given rise to varieties with bright blue, pink, and
distinctly yellow flowers. These three primary colours do not
occur in the varieties of any other species ; nor do they often all
occur even in the distinct species of tiie same genus. Although the
several kinds of hyacinths differ but slightl;y from each other except
in colour, yet each kind has its own individual character, which
(*aii be recognised by a highly educated eye ; thus the writer of the
Amsterdam treatise asserts (p. 43) that some experienced florists,
such as the famous G. Yoorhelin, seldom failed in a collection of
above twelve hundred sorts to recognise each variety by the bulb
alone! This same writer mentions some few singular variations:
for instance, the hyacinth commonly produces six leaves, but there
is one kind (p. 35) which scarcely ever has more than three leaves ;
another never more than five; w’hilst others regularly produce
either seven or eight leaves. A variety, called la Coryphee, in-
variably produces (p. 116) two flower-stems, united together and
covered by one skin. The flower-stem in another kind (p. 128)
comes out of the ground in a coloured sheath, before the appearance
of the leaves, and is consequently liable to suffer from frost.
Another variety always pushes a second flower-stem after the first
has begun to develop itself. Lastly, white hyacinths with red,
purple, or violet centres (p. 129) are the most liable to rot. Thus,
‘Des Jacinthes, de leur Ana- Alph. de Candolle, ‘Geograph
toniie, ReproductLr , et Culture.’ Bot.,’ p. 1082
Am:;tei'dam, 1768,
896
FLOWERS.
Chav. X.
the hyacinth, like vo ma,ny previous plants, wlien long: cultivated
and closely watched, is found to offer many singular variations.
In the two last chapters I have given in some detail the
range of variation, and the history:, as far as known, of a
considerable number of plants, which have been cultivated
for various purposes. But some of the most variable plants,
such as Kidney-beans, Capsicum, Millets, Sorghum, &c., have
been passed over ; for botanists are not at all agreed which
kinds ought to rank as species and which as varieties ;
and the wild parent-species are unknown. Many plants
long cultivated in tropical countries, such as the Banana,
have produced numerous varieties ; but as these have never
been described with even moderate care, they are here also
passed over. Nevertheless, a sufficient, and perhaps more
than sufficient, number of cases have h<^en given, so that the
reader may be enabled to judge for himself on the nature and
great amount of variation which cultivated plants have
undergone.
198 Alph. de Candolle, ‘ Geograph. Bot.,’ p. 983.
Chap. XI.
BUD-YARIATIOX.
397
CHAPTEE XI.
ON BUD- VARIATION’, AND ON CERTAIN ANOMALOUS MODES OF
REPRODUCTION AND VARIATION.
3HD-VARIATION IN THE PEACH, PLUM, CHEERY, VINE, GOOSEBERRY, CURRANT^
AND BANANA, AS SHOWN BY THE MODIFIED FRUIT — IN FLOWERS I
CAMELLIAS, AZALEAS, CHRYSANTHEMUMS, ROSES, ETC. — ON THE RUNNING
OF THE COLOt R IN CARNATIONS — BUD-VARIATIONS IN LEAVES — VARIA-
TIONS BY SUCKERS, TUBERS, AND BULBS — ON THE BREAKING OF TULIPS
— BUD-VARIATIONS GRADUATE INTO CHANGES CONSEQUENT ON CHANGED
CONDITIONS OF LIFE — GRAFT-HYBRIDS —ON THE SEGREGATION OF THE
PARENTAL CHARACTERS IN SEMINAL HYBRIDS BY BUD-VARIATION — ON
THE DIRECT OR IMMEDIATE ACTION OP FOREIGN POLLEN ON THE MOTHER-
PLANT — ON THE EFFECTS IN FEMALE ANIMALS OP A PREVIOUS IMPREG-
NATION ON THE SUBSEQUENT OFFSPRING — CONCLUSION AND SUMMARY.
This chapter will be chiefly devoted to a subject in many
respects important, namely, bud-variation. By this term I
include all those sudden changes in structure or appearance
which occasionally occur in full-grown plants in their flower-
buds or leaf-buds. Gardeners call such changes “ Sports
but this, as previously remarked, is an ill-defined expression,
as it has often been applied to strongly marked variations in
seedling plants. The difference between seminal and bud
reproduction is not so great as it at first appears ; for each
bud is in one sense a new and distinct individual ; but such
individuals are produced through the formation of various
kinds of buds without the aid of any- special apparatus,
whilst fertile seeds are produced by the concourse of the two
sexual elements. The modifications which arise through
bud-variation can generally be propagated to any extent by
grafting, budding, cuttings, bulbs, &c., and occasionally even
by seed. Some few of our most beautiful and useful pro-
ductions have arisen by bud-variation.
Bud-variatious have as yet been observed only in the
vegetable kingdom ; but it is probable that if compound
animals, such as corals, &c., had been subjected to a long
398
BUD-VAKIATION.
Chap. XL
course of domestication, they would have varied by buds ;
for they resoaible plants in many respects. For instance, any
new or peculiar character presented a compound animal is
propagated by budding, as occurs with differently coloured
Hydras, and as Mr. Gosse has shown to De The case with a
singular variety of a true coral. Varieties of the ITycb-a
have also been grafted on other varieties, and haA’e retained
tlieir character.
I will in the first place give all the cases of bud variations
which I have been able to collect, and afterwards show tlicir
importance.’^ These cases prove that those authors who,
like Pallas, attribute all variability to the crossing either of
distinct races, or of distinct individuals belonging to the
same race but somewhat different from each other, are in
error ; as are those authors who attribute ail variability to
the mere act of sexual union. Nor can we account in all cases
for the appearance through bud-variation of new cliaracters
by the princible of reversion to long-lost characters. He
who wishes to judge how far the conditions of life directly
cause each particular variation ought to reflect well on the
cases immediately to be given. I will commence with bud
variations, as exhibited in the fruit, and then pass on to
flowers, and finally to leaves.
Peach {Amyg(halui^ persica). — In the last chapter I gave two cases
of a peach-almond and a double-flowered almond which suddenly
])roduced fruit closely resembling true peaches. I have also given
many cases of peach-trees producing buds, which, when developed
into branches, have yielded nectarines. We have seen that no less
than six named and several unnamed varieties of the peach have
thus produced several varieties of nectarine. I have shown that
it is highly improbable that all these pciach-trees, some of which
are old varieties, and have been propagated by the million, are
hybrids from the peach and nectarine, and that it is opposed
to all analogy to attribute the occasional production of nectarines
* Since the publication of the first
edition of this work, I have found that
M. Carrifere, Chef des Pepinieres a'l
Mus. d'ff/st. Nat., in his excellent
hssay, ‘ Production et Fixation des
Vari.tds, 1865,’ has given a list of
bud-variations far more extensive
than mine ; but as these relate chiefly
to cases occurring in France 1 have
left my list as it stood, adding
a few facts from IM. Carrifere and
others. Any one who wishes to
study the subject fully saould refti
to M. Carriere’s Essav'.
Cn-^K XI.
FRUIT.
899
on peach-trees to the direct action of pollen from some neighbonring
nectarine-tree. Several of the cases are highly remarkable, bccanso,
firstly, the frnit thus produced has sometimes been in part a
nectarine and in part a peach ; secondly, because nectarines tlius
suddenly produced have reproduced themselves by seed ; and thirdly,
because nectarines are produced from peach-trees from seed as
well as from buds. The seed of the nectarine, on the other ha.nd,
occasionally produces peaches ; and we have seen in one instance
that a nectarine-tree yielded peaches by bud-variation. As the
peach is certainly the oldest or primary variety, the production
of peaches from nectarines, either by seeds or buds, may perhaps
be con.udered as a case of reversion. Certain trees have also
been described as indifferently bearing peaches or nectarines, and
this may be considered as bud- variation carried to an extreme
degree.
The grosse mignonne peach at Montreuil produced "^from a
sporting branch ” the grosse mignonne tardive, “ a most excellent
variety,” which ripens its fruit a fortnight later than the parent
tree, and in equally good.^ This same peach has likewise produced
by bud- variation the early grosre mignonne. Hunt’s large tawny
nectarine “ originated from Hunt's small tawny nectarine, but not
through seminal reproduction.”^
Flums. — Mr. Knight states that a tree of the yellow magnum
bonum plum, forty years old, which had . always borne ordinary
Iruit, produced a branch which yielded red magnum bonums.^
Mr. Eivers, of Sawbridgeworth, informs me Man. 1863) that a
single tree out of 400 or 500 trees of the Early Prolific plum, which
is a purple kind, descended from an old French variety bearing
purple fruit, produced when about ten years old bright yellow
plums ; these differed in no respect except colour from those on
the other trees, but were unlike any other known kind of yellow
plum.®
Cherry {Frunus ceramd). — ^Mr. Knight has recorded (ibid.) the
case of a branch of a May-Duke cherry, which, though certainly
never grafted, always produced fruit, ripening later, and more
oblong than the fruit on the other branches. Another account
has been given of two May-Duke cherry-trees in Scotland, with
branches bearing oblong and very fine fruit, which invariably
ripened, as in Knight’s case, a fortnight later than the other cherries.®
M. Carriei’e gives (p. 37) numerous analogous cases, and one of the
same tree bearing three kinds of fruit.
Grapes ( Vitis vinifera). — The black ,or purple Frontignan in
* ‘Gardener’s Chron.,* 1854. p. 821.
* Lindiey’s ‘ Gride to Orchai'd,’ as
quoted in ‘ Gardener’s Chron.’ 1852. p.
821. F<)r the Early mignonne peach',
gee ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1834, p.
1251.
■* ‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. ii. p.
160.
^ See also ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,
1863, p. 27.
“ ‘Gard. Chror.,’ 1852, p. 821.
400
BUD-VARIATION.
Chap. XI.
one case produced during two successive years v^-ud no doubt
permanently) spurs which bore white Frontignan grapes. In
another case, on the same footstalk, the lower berries “ were well-
coloured black Frontignans; those next the stalk were white,
with the exception of one black and one streaked berry ; ” and
altogetlier there were fifteen black and twelve white berries on the
same stalk. In another kind of gray)0, black and amber-coloured
berries were protiuced in the same cluster.^ Count Odart describes
a variety which often bears on the same stalk small round and
large oblong berries; though the shape of the berry is generally
a fixed character.® Here is another striking case given on the
excellent authority of M. Carriere:® “a black Hamburg grape
(Frankenthal) was cut down, and produced three suckers ; one
of these was layered, and after a time produced much smaller
berries, which always ripened at least a fortnight earlier than
the others. Of the remaining two suckers, one produced every
year fine grapes, whilst the other, although it set an abundance
of fruit, matured only a few, and these of inferior quality.”
Gooseberry {lubes grossularia). — A remarkable case has been
described by l)r. Lindley of a bush wdiich bore at the same time
no less than four kinds of berries, namely, hairy and red, — smooth,
small and red,— green, — and yellow tinged with buff; the two
latter kinds had a different flavour from the red berries, and their
seeds were coloured red. Three twigs on this bush grew close
together ; the first bore three yellow berries and one red ; the
second twig bore four yellow and one red; and the third four red
and one yellow. Mr. Laxton also informs me that he has seen
a Eed Warrington gooseberry bearing both red and yellow fruit
on the same branch.
Currant {Itlbes rubrum). — A bush purchased as the Champagne,
which is a variety that bears blush-coloured fruit intermediate
between red and white, produced during fourteen years on separate
branches and mingled on the same branch, berries of the red, white,
and champagne kinds.^^ The suspicion naturally arises that this
variety may have originated from a cross between a red and white
variety, and that the above transformation may be accounted for
by reversion to both parent-forms; but from the foregoing complex
case of the gooseberry this view is doubtful. In France, a branch
of a red-currant bush, about ten years old, produced near the
summit five white berries, and lower down, amongst the red berries,
^ G ii-dener’s Ghron.,’ 1852, p. 629 ;
1856, p. 64-8; 1864, p. 986. Other
^ases are given by Braun ‘ Rejuvene-
icence,’ in ‘ Ray Soc. Bot. Mem.,’
1856, p. 314,
“ ‘ Ampelographie.’&c., 1849, p. 71.
® ‘ Gardeuer’;s Chronicle,’ 1866, p.
97 V).
‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,* 1855, pp.
597, 612.
“ ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,* 1842, p.
873 ; 1855, p. 646. In the ‘Chroni-
cle,’ p. 876, Mr. P. Mackenzie states
that the bush still continues to bear
the three kinds of fruit, ‘‘although
they ha,-e not been every year alike.
Chap. XL
FT.OWERS.
401
one berry half red and half white.'^ Alexander Braun also has
often seen branches on white currant-trees bearing red berries.
Pear {Pyrus coramuniP). — Bureau de la Malle states that the
flowers on some trees of an ancient variety, the doyenne yah ux, were
destroyed by frost : other flowers appeared in July, which produced
six pears; these exactly resembled in their skin and taste the
fruit of a distinct variety, the ^rros doyenne- Piano, but in shape
were like the hon-oliretien: it was not ascertained whether this
new variety could be propagated by budding or grafting. The
same author grafted a bon-chretkn on a quince, and it produced,
besides its proper fruit, an apparently new variety, of a peculiar
form with thick and rough skin.^^
Apple (Pyrus maius'). — In Canada, a tree of the variety called
Pound Sweet, produced,^® between two of its proper fruit, an apple
which was well russeted, small in size, different in shape, and
with a short peduncle. As no russet apple grew anywhere near,
this case apparently cannot be accounted for by the direct action
of foreign pollen. M. Carrim’e (p. 38) mentions an analogous
instance. 1 shall hereafter give cases of apple-trees which regu-
larly produce fruit of two kinds, or half-and-half fruit ; these trees
are generally supposed, and probably with truth, to be of crossed
parentage, and that the fruit reverts to both parent-forms.
Banana (Musa sapientium).—^\Y E. Schomburgk states that he
saw in St. Domingo a r-acerne on the Pig Banana which bore
towards the base 125 fruits of the proper kind; and these were
succeeded, as is usual, higher up the raceme, by barren flowers,
and these by 420 fruits, ha\ing a widely different appearance, and
ripening earlier than the proper fruit. The abnormal fruit closely
resembled, except in being smaller, that of the Musa chivensis or
oavendisliii, which has generally been ranked as a distinct species.^®
Flowees.— Many cases have been recorded of a whole plant, or
single branch, or bud, suddenly producing flowers different from
the proper type in colour, form, size, doubleness, or other character.
Half the flower, or a smaller segment, sometimes changes colour.
Camellia. — The myrtle-leaved species (C. myrtifolia'), and two or
three varieties of the common species, have been kno-wn to produce
hexagonal and imperfectly quadrangular flowers ; and the branches
producing such flowers have been propagated by grafting.^^ The
Pompon variety often bears ‘^four distinguishable kinds of flowers,
— the pure white and the red-eyed, which appear promiscuously ;
the brindled pink and the rose-coloured, which may be kept
Revue Horticole,’ quoted in
' Gard. Chronicle,* 1844, p. 87.
‘ RejuA'enescence in Nature,’ Bot.
Menu'irs Ray Soc.,* 1853, p. 314.
‘Comptes Rendus,* tom. xli.
1855, ]>. 801. The second case is
"ivcr, on the authority of Gaudichaud,
27
ibid., tom. xxxiv., 1852, p. 748.
. This case is given in the ‘ Gai’d.
Chronicle,’ 1867, p. 403.
‘Journal of • Proc. I, inn. Sou.,
vol. ii. Botany, p. 131.
‘ Gard. Chronic.e,’ 1847, p. 207.
m
BUD -VARIATION.
Chap. Xi.
“ separate with tolerable certainty by grafting from the branches
“ thiit bear them.” A branch, also, on an old tree of the ro'se-coloiired
variety has been seen to “ revert to the pure wliite colour, an
“ occurrence less common than the departure from it.”
Oraioegus oxyarantha. — A dark pink hawthorn has been known to
throw out a single tuft of pure white blossoms ; and Mr. A.
Clapham, nurseryman, of Bedford, informs me that his father had a
deep crimson thorn grafted on a white thorn, which during several
years, always bore, ingli above the graft, bunches of white, pink and
deep crimson flowers.
Azalea indica is well known often to produce new varieties by
buds. I have myself seen several cases. A plant of Azalea indica
variegaia has been exhibited bearing a truss of flowers of A. ind.
gleddaatsii “ as true as could possibly be produced, thus evidencing
the origin of that fine variety.” On another plant of A. ind. varie-
gata a perfect flower of A. ind. Jateritia was produced; so that both
ghdstanesii and latevitia no doubt originally appeared as sporting
branches of A. ind. variegataA^
Hibiscus {Paritium tricuspis'). — A seedling of this plant, when some
years old, produced, at Saharunpore,^^ some branches which bore
leaves and flowers widely different from the normal form.” “ The
abnormal leaf is much less divided, and not acuminated. The
petals are considerably larger, and quite entire. There is also in
the fresh state a conspicuous, large, oblong gland, full of a viscid
secretion, on the back of each of the calycine segments.” Dr. King,
who subsequently had charge of these Gardens, informs me that a
tree of Paritium tricuspis (probably the very same plant) growing
there, had a branch buried in the ground, apparently by accident ;
and this branch changed its character wonderfully, growing like a
bush, and producing flowers and leaves, resembling in shape those
of another species, viz., P. tiliaceum. A small branch springing
from this bush near the ground, reverted to the parent-form.
Both f()]’ms were extensively propagated during several years by
cuttings and kept perfectly true.
Althcea rosea. — A double yellow Hollyhock suddenly turned one
year into a pure white single kind; subsequently a branch bearing
the original double yellow flowers reappeared in the midst of the
branches of the single white kind.^^
Pelargonium. — These highly cultivated plants seem eminently
liable to bud-variation. I will give only a few well-marked cases.
Gartiior has seen''^^ a plant of P. zonede with a branch having white
18 Herbert, ‘ Amaryllidace^,’ 1838,
p. 369.
19 ‘ Gardener’s Chronicle,’ 1843, p.
391.
20 Exhibited at Hort. Soc., London.
Report in ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1844,
p. 337.
21 Mr. W. Bell, Bot. Soc. of Edin-
burgh, May, 1863.
22 ‘ Revue Horticole,’ quoted in
‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1845, p. 475.
23 ‘ Bastarderzeugung,’ 1849, s.
76.
Chap. XL
FLOV/EKS.
408
edges, which remained constant for years, and bore flowers of a
deeper red than usual. Generally speahing, such branches present
little or no difference in their flowers : thus a writer pinched ofl
the leading shoot of a seedling P. zonale, and it threw out three
branches, which differed in the size and colour of their leaves and
stems; but on all three branches ‘Ghe flowers were identical,”
except in being largest in the green-stemmed variety, and smallest
in that with variegated foliage : these three varieties were sub-
sequently propagated and distributed. Many branches, and some
whole plants, of a variety called compactum, which bears orange-
scarlet flowers, have been seen to produce pink flowers.^^ Hill’s
Hector, which is a pale red variety, produced a branch with lilac
flowers, and some trusses with both red and lilac flowers. This
apparently is a case of reversion, for Hill’s Hector was a seedling
from a lilac variety.^® Here is a better case of reversion : a variety
produced from a complicated cross, after having been propagated
for five generations by seed, yielded by bud-variation three very
distinct varieties which were undistinguishable from plants,
“known to have been at some time ancestors of the plant in
question.” Of all Pelargoniums, Eollisson’s Unique seems to be
the most sportive ; its origin is not positively known, but is believed
to be from a cross. Mr. Salter, of Hammersmith, states that he
has himself known this purple variety to produce the lilac, the
rose-crimson or conspicuum, and the red or coccineum varieties; the
latter has also produced the rose d'amour ; so that altogether four
varieties have originated by bud variation from Eollisson’s Unique.
Mr. Salter remarks that these four varieties “may now be con-
“ sidered as fixed, although they occasionally produce flowers of
“ the original colour. This year coccineum has pushed flowers of
“ three different colours, red, rose, and lilac, upon the same truss,
“ and upon other trusses are flowers half red and half lilac.”
Besides these four varieties, two other scarlet Uniques are known to
exist, both of which occasionally produce lilac flowers identical
with Eollisson’s Unique ; but one at least of these did not arise
through bud-variation, but is believmd to be a seedling from Eollis-
son’s Unique.” There are, also, in the trade two other slightly
different varieties, of unknown origin, of Eollisson’s Unique ; so
that altogether we have a curiously complex case of variation both
by buds and seeds.®^ Here is a still more complex case : M. Eafarin
‘ Journal of Horticulture,’ 1861,
p 336.
W. P. Ayres, in ‘ Gardener’s
^ra'on.,’ 1842, p. 791.
W. P. Ayres, ibid.
Dr. Maxwell Masters, ‘ Pop.
Science Review,’ July, 1872, p. 250.
‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’ 1861, p
968.
28 Ibid , 1861, p. 945.
8® W. Paul, in ‘ Gardener’s Chron.,’
1861, p. 968.
Ibid., p. 945.
*2 For other cases of bud-variation
in this same variety, see ‘ Gardener’s
Chron.,’ 1861, pp. 578, 600, 925. For
other distinct’ cases of bud-variation
in the genus Pelargonium, see ‘Cot-
tage Gardener,’ 1860. p. 194.
404
BUD-VARIATION.
Chap. XI
states that a pale rose-coloured variety produced a branch bearing
deep red flowers. “ Cuttings were taken from this ‘ sport,’ from
“ which 20 plants were raised, which flowered in 1867, when it was
“ found that scarcely two were alike.” Some resembled the parent-
form, some resembled the sport, some bore both kinds of flowers ;
and even some of the petals on the same flower were rose-coloured
and others red.^^ An English wild plant, the Geranium jpraiense,
when cultivated in a garden, has been seen to produce on the same
plant both blue and white, and striped blue and white flowers.^^
Chrysanthemum. — This plant fr-equently sports, both by its lateral
branches and occasionally by suckers. A seedling raised by
Mr, Salter has produced by bud-variation six distinct sorts, five
different in colour and one in foliage, all of which are now fixed.®®
A variety called cedo nulli bears small yellow flowers, but habitu-
ally produces branches with white flowers; and a specimen was
exhibited, which Prof. T. Dyer saw, before the Horticultural Society.
The varieties which were first introduced from China wx're so
excessively variable, that it was extremely difficult to tell which
was the original colour of the variety, and which w^as the sport.”
The same plant would produce one year only buff-coloured, and
next year only rose-coloured flowers; and then would change again,
or produce at the same time flowers of both colours. These &uc-
tuating varieties are now ail lost, and, when a branch sports into a
new variety, it can generally be propagated and kept true ; but, as
Mr, Salter remarks, every sport should be thoroughly tested in
“ different soils before it can be really considered as fixed, as many
‘‘ have been known to run back when planted in rich compost ; but
‘‘ when sufficient care and time are expended in proving, there will
exist little danger of subsequent disappointment.” Mr. Salter
informs me that with all the varieties the commonest kind of bud-
variation is the production of yellow flowers, and, as this is the
primordial colour, these cases may be attributed to reversion.
Mr. Salter has given me a list of seven differently coloured chrysan-
themums, which have all produced branches with yellow flowers ;
but three of them have also sported into other colours. With any
change of colour in the flower, the foliage generally changes in a
corresponding manner in lightness or darkness.
Another Composi tons plant, namely, Gent auriacy anus, vflie.w culti-
vated in a garden, not unfrequently produces on the same root flowers
of four different colours, viz , blue, white, dark-purple, and parti-
coloured.®® The flowers of Anthemis also vary on the same ])lant,®’
Roses. — Many varieties of the Eose are known or are believed to
Dr. Maxwell Masters, ‘ Pop.
Science Review,’ July, 1872, p. 254.
Rev. W. T. Bree, in Loudon’s
‘ Gard. Mag.,’ vol. viii., 1832, p. 93.
‘The Chi’ysanthemum : its His-
tory and Cibture,’by 1. Salter, 1865,
p. 41, &c.
Bree, in Loudon’s ‘ Garl. IMag.,
vol. viii., 1832, p. 93.
Bronn, ‘ Geschi hte der Natur,
B. ii. s. 123.
rHAP, XI.
FLOWERS.
405
have originated by bud- variation,^® The common double moss-rose
was imported into 'England from Italy about the year 1733.®® Its
origin is unknown, but from analogy it probably arose from the
Provence rose {H centifoUd) by bud-variation ; for the branches of
the common moss-rose have several times been known to produce
Provence roses, wholly or partially destitute of moss : I have seen
one such instance, and several others have been recorded.^®
Mr. Rivers also informs me that he raised two or three roses of
the Provence class from seed of the old single moss-rose ; and this
latter kind was produced in 1807 by bud-variation from the com-
mon moss-rose. The white moss-rose was also produced in 1788
by an offset from the common red moss-rose : it was at first pale
blush-coloured, but became w^hite by continued budding. On
cutting down the shoots which had produced this white moss-rose,
two weak shoots were -thrown up, and buds from these yielded the
beautiful striped moss-rose. The common moss-rose has yielded
by bud-variation, besides the old single red moss-rose, the old
ficarlet semi -double moss-rose, and the sage-leaf moss-rose, which
“ has a delicate shell-like form, and is of a beautiful blush colour ;
it is now (1852) nearly extinct.'”'^® A white moss-rose has been
seen to bear a flow^er half white and half pink.^® Although several
moss-roses have thus certainly arisen by bud- variation, the greater
number probably owe their origin to seed of moss-roses For
Mr. Eivers informs me that his seedlings from the old single moss-
rose almost always produced moss-roses ; and the old single moss-rose
was, as we have seen, the product by bud- variation of the double
moss-rose originally imported from Italy. That the original moss-
rose was the product of bud-variation is probable, from the facts
above given and from the de Meaux moss-rose (also a variety of
R. centifoUd) having appeared as a sporting branch on the
common rose de Meaux. Prof. Caspary has carefully described'^®
the case of a six-year-old white moss-rose, which sent up several
suckers, one of which was thorny, and produced red flowers,
destitute of moss, exactly like those of the Provence rose {R. centi-
folia) : another shoot bore both kinds of flowers, and in addition
longitudinally striped flowers. As this wdiite moss-rose had been
grafted on the Provence rose. Prof. Caspary attributes the above
38 T. Rivers, ‘Rose Amateur’s
Guide,’ 1837, p. 4.
39 Mr. Shailer, quoted in ^ Gar-
dener’s Chron.,’ 1848, p. 759.
40 ‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. iv.
1822, p. 137; ‘Gard. Chron.,’ 1842,
p. 422.
41 See also Loudon’s ‘ Arboretum,’
vol. ii. p. 780.
42 All these statements on the
origin of the several varieties of the
moss-rose are given on the authority
of Mr. Shailer, who, together with
his father, was concerned in their
original propagation. See ‘ Gard.
Chron.,’ 1852, p. 759.
43 ‘ Gard. Chron.,’ 1845, p. 564.
44 ‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. ii. p,
242.
45‘Schriften der Phys. Oekon.
Gesell. zu Konigsberg,’ Feb. 3, 1865,
8. 4. See also Dr. Caspary’s paper in
‘ Transactions of the Hort. Congress
of Amsterdam,’ 1865.
406
BUD-YAllIATION.
Chap XI
clianges to the influence of the stock; but from the facts already
given, and from others to be given, bud- variation, with reversion,
is probably a sufficient explanation.
Many other instances could be added of roses varying by buds.
The while Provence rose apparently originated in this way.^° M.
Carriere states (p. 36) that he himself knows of five varieties thus
produced by the Baronne Prevost. The double and highly-coloured
Belladonna rose has produced by suckers both semi-double and
almost single white roses; whilst suckers from one of these semi-
double white roses reverted to perfectly characterised Belladonnas.
In St. Domingo, varieties of the China rose propagated by cuttings
often revert after a year or two into the old China rose.**^ Many
cases have been recorded of roses suddenly becoming striped or
changing their character by segments : some plants of the Comtesse
de Chabrillant, which is properly rose-coloured, were exhibited in
1862,^^ with crimson flakes on a rose ground. I have seen the
Beauty of Billiard with a quarter and with half the flower almost
white. The Austrian bramble {li. lutea) not rarely®® produces
branches with pure yellow flowers; and Prof. Henslow has seen
exactly half the flower of a pure yellow, and I have seen narrow
yellow streaks on a single petal, of which the rest was of the usual
copper colour.
The following cases are highly remarkable. Mr. Eivers, as I am
informed by him, possessed a new French rose with delicate smooth
shoots, pale glaucous-green leaves, and semi-double pale flesh-coloured
flowers striped with dark red ; and on branches thus characterised
there suddenly appeared in more than one instance, the famous old
rose called the Baronne Prevost, with its stout thorny shoots, and
immense, uniformly and richly coloured double flowers; eo that in
this case the shoots, leaves, and flowers, all at once chaoged their
character by bud-variation. According to M. Verlot,®^ a variety
called Ro&a i^annabifoUa, which has peculiarly shaped leaflets, and
differs from every member of the family in the leaves being opposite
instead of alternate, suddenly appeared on a plant of li. alba in the
gardens of the Luxembourg. Lastly, “ a running shoot ” was observed
by Mr. H. Curtis®^ on the old Aimee Vibert Noisette, and he budded it
on Celine; thus a climbing Aimee Yibert was first produced and
afterwards propagated.
Diantlius. — It is quite common with the Sweet "William (Z).
barbatus) to see differently coloured flowers on the same root; and I
have observed on the same truss four differently coloured and
shaded flowers. Carnations and pinks (D. caryophyllus, &c.) occa-
‘ Gard. Chron.,* 1852, p. 759.
4’ ‘ transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. ii. p.
242
4® Sir R. Schomburgk, ‘ Free.
Lina. Snc. Bot.,’ vol. ii. p. 132.
46 ‘GarJ. Cnron.,’ 1862. p. 619.
Hopkirk’s ‘ Flora Anomala,’ 167.
' Sur la Production ot la Fixation
dcs Var etes,’ 1865. p. 4.
'Journal of Horticulture,’ March.
1865, p. 233.
Chap. X[.
FLOWEES.
407
sionally vary by layers; and some kinds are so little certain in
character that they are called by floriculturists “catch-flowers.”®"
Mr. Dickson has ably discussed the “ running ” of particoloured or
striped carnations, and says it cannot be accounted for by the
compost in which they are grown: “layers from the same clean
“ flower would come part of them clean and part foul, even when
“ subjected to precisely the same treatment; and frequently one
“ flower alone appears influenced by the taint, the remainder coming
“ perfectly clean.” This running of the parti-coloured flowers
apparently is a case of reversion by buds to the original uniform
tint of the species.
I will briefly mention some other cases of bud- variation to show
how many plants belonging to many orders have varied in their
flowers; and many others might be added. I have seen on a snap-
dragon (^Antirrhinum majus) white, pink, and striped flowers on
the same plant, and branches with striped flowers on a red-coloured
variety. On a double stock (Mathiola incana) I have seen a branch
bearing single flowers; and on a dingy-purple double variety of
the wall-flower (Chtiranthus cheiri), a branch which had reverted to
the ordinary copper colour. On other branches of the same plant,
some flowers were exactly divided across the middle, one half being-
purple and the other coppery; but some of the smaller petals
towards the centre of these same flowers were purple longitudinally
streaked with coppery colour, or coppery streaked with purple.
A Cyclamen ®® has been observed to bear white and pink flowers of
two forms, the one resembling the Persicum strain, and the other
the Coum strain. Oenothera biennis has been seen®® bearing flowers
of three different colours. The hybrid Gladiolus col oilii occasionally
bears uniformly coloured flowers, and one case is recorded of all
the flowers on a plant thus changing colour. A Fuchsia has been
seen bearing two kinds of flowers. Mirabilis jalapa is eminently
sportive, sometimes bearing on the same root pure red, yellow, and
white flowers, and others striped with various combinations of
these three colours.®® The plants of the Mirabilis, which bear
such extraordinarily variable flowers in most, probably in all, cases,
owe their origin, as shown by Prof. Lecoq, to crosses between
differently coloured varieties.
Leaves and Shoots. — Changes, through bud-variation, in fruits and
flowers havm hitherto been treated of ; incidentally some remarkable
modiflcations in the leaves and shoots of the rose and Paritium, and
®®*‘Gard. Chron.,’ 1843, p. 135.
Joid., 1842, p. 55.
• Gard. Chron.,’ 1867, p. 235,
Gartuor, ‘ Ba^^tarderzeugung,’ s.
365.
Mr. D. Beaton, in ‘ Cottage G.;r-
dener,’ 1860, p. 250.
‘ Gard. Chron.,’ 1850, p 536.
Braun, ‘ Kay Soc. Bot. Mem.
1853, p. 315; Hopkirk’s ‘Flora Ano
mala,’ p. 164 ; Lecoq, ‘ Geograph
Bot. de i’Europe,’ tom. iii., 1854-, p
405 ; and ‘ De la Fecondation,* 1862
p. 303.
408
BUD-VARIATION.
Chap. XI.
in a lesser degree in the foliage of the Pe'argoninra and Chrysan-
themum, have been noticed. 1 will now add a few more cases of
variation in leaf-buds. Verlot°“ states that on Aralia trifoUata,
which properly has leaves with three leaflets, branches frequently
appear bearing simple leaves of various forms; these can be propa-
gated by buds or by grafting, and have given rise, as he states, to
several nominal species.
With respect to trees, the history of but few of the many varieties
with curious or ornamental foliage is known ; but several probably
have originated by bud- variation. Here is one case : — An old ash-
tree {l^'raxinus excelsior) in the grounds of Necton, as Mr. Mason
states, “ for many years has had one bough of a totally different
character to the rest of the tree, or of any other ash-tree which I
have seen; being short-jointed and densely covered with foliage.”
It was ascertained, that this variety could be propagated by
grafts.®^ The varieties of some trees with cut leaves, as the oak-
leaved laburnum, the parsley-leaved vine, and especially the fern-
leaved beech, are apt to revert by buds to the common forms.®^
The fern-like leaves of the beech sometimes revert only partially,
and the branches display here and there sprouts bearing common
leaves, fern-like, and variously shaped leaves. Such cases differ
but little from the so-called heterophyllus varieties, in which the
tree habitually bears leaves of various forms; but it is probable
that most heterophyllous trees have originated as seedlings. There
is a sub- variety of the weeping willow with haves rolled up into
a spiral coil ; and Mr. Masters states that a tree of this kind kept
true in his garden for twenty -five years, and then threw out a single
upright shoot bearing flat leaves.®^
I have often noticed single twigs and branches on beech and
other trees with their leaves fully expanded before those on the
other branches had opened; and as there was nothing in their
exposure or char.acter to account for this difference, I presume that
they had appeared as bud-variations, like the early and late fruit-
maturing varieties of the iDeach and nectarioe.
Cryptogamic plants are liable to bud-variation, for fronds on
the same fern often display remarkable deviations of structure.
Spores, which are of the nature of buds, taken from such abnormal
fronds, reproduce, with remarkable fidelity, the same variety, after
passing through the sexual stage.®^
With respect to colour, leaves often become by bud-variation
zoned, blotched, or spotted with white, yellow, and red; and this
‘Des Varietes,’ 1865, p. 5.
W. Mason, in ‘ Gard. Chron.,*
18+3, p. 878.
Braun, ‘ Ray Soc. But.
Mem ,’ 1853, p. 315 ; ‘ Gard. Chron ,
i8+l, p. 329.
Dr. M. T. Masters, ‘ Royal Insti-
tution Lecture,’ March 16, 1860.
See Mr. W. K. Bridgman’s curious
paper in ‘ Annals and Mag. of Nat.
Hist.,’ December, 1861 ; also Mr. J.
Scott, ‘ Bot Soc. Ldinburgh,’ June 12,
1862.
Chap. XI.
LEAVES AND SHOOTS.
409
occasionally occurs even with plants in a state of nature. Variega-
tion, ‘however, appears still more frequently in plants produced
from seed ; even the cotyledons or seed-leaves being thus atfected.^®
There have been endless disputes whether variegation should be
considered as a disease. In a future chapter we shall see that it is
much influenced, both in the case of seedlings and of mature plants,
by the nature of the soil. Plants which have become variegated as
seedlings, generally transmit their character by seed to a large
proportion of their progeny ; and Mr. Salter has given me a list of
eight genera in which this occurred.^® Sir F. Pollock has given me
more precise information : he sowed seed from a variegated plant
of Ballota nigra which was found grovdng wild, and thirty per
cent, of the seedlings were variegated ; seed from these latter being
sown, sixty per cent, came up variegated. When branches become
variegated by bud- variation, and the variety is attempted to be
propagated by seed, the seedlings are rarely variegated : Mr. Salter
found this to be the case with plants belonging to eleven genera,
in which the greater number of the seedlings proved to be green-
leaved ; yet a few were slightly variegated, or were quite white, but
none were worth keeping. Variegated plants, whether originally
produced from seeds or buds, can generally be propagated by
budding, grafting, &c. ; but all are apt to revert by bud-variation
to their ordinary foliage. This tendency, however, differs much i]i
the varieties of even the same species ; for instance, the golden-
striped variety of Euonymus japonicus “ is very liable to run back
to the green-leaved, while the silver-striped variety hardly ever
changes.”®^ I have seen a variety of the holly, with its leaves
having a central yellow patch, which had everywhere partially
reverted to the ordinary foliage, so that on the same small branch
there were many twigs of both kinds. In the j)elargonium, and in
some other plants, variegation is generally accompanied by some
degree of dwarfing, as is well exemplified in the “ Dandy ” pelargo-
nium. When such dwarf varieties sport back by buds or suckers
to the ordinary foliage, the dwarfed stature still remains,®® It is
remarkable that plants propagated from branches which have
reverted from variegated to plain leaves ®® do not always (or never,
as one observer asserts) perfectly resemble the original plain-leaved
plant from which the variegated branch arose : it seems that a
plant, in passing by bud- variation from plain leaves to variegated,
and back again from variegated to plain, is generally in some degree
affected so as to assume a slightly different aspect.
Bud-variation by Suckers, Tubers, and Bulbs. — All the cases
hitherto given of bud-variation in fruits, flowers, leaves, and shoots,
have been confined to buds on the stems or branches, with the
‘ Journal of Horticulture,’ 1861, ‘ Gard. Chron.,* 1844, p. 86.
p. 336 ; Verlot, ‘Des Varietes.’ p. 76. Ibid., 1861, p. 963.
5!c?<? also Verlot, ‘ Des Varietes,’ p. Ibid., 1861, p. 433; ‘Cottage
'’4. Gardener.’ 1860, p. 2.
410
BUD-VARIATION.
Chap. XI.
exception of a few cases incidentally noticed of varying snekers in
the rose, pelargoniuiH, and chrysanthemum. I will now give a few
instances of variation in subterranean buds, that is, by suckers,
tubers, ami bulbs; not that there is any essential difterence between
buds above and beneath the ground. Mr. Salter informs me that
two variegated varieties of Phlox originated as suckers; but I
should not have thought these worth mentioning, had not Mr. Salter
found, after repeated trials, that he could not propagate them by
“ root-joints,” whereas, the variegated Tussilago farfara can thus be
safely propagated but this latter plant may have originated as a
variegated seedling, which would account for its greater fixedness
of character. The Barberry (Berherin vulgaris) offers an analogous
case ; there is a well-known variety with seedless fruit, which can
be propagated by cuttings or layers ; but suckers always revert to
the common form, which produces fruit containing seeds.^^ My
father repeatedly tried this experiment, and always with the
same result. I may here mention that maize and wheat some-
times produce new varieties from the stock or root, as does the
sugar- cane.'^^
Turning now to tubers : in the common Potato {Solarium tuherosum)
a single bud or eye sometimes varies and produces a new variety ;
or, occasionally, and this is a much more remarkable circumstance,
all the eyes in a tuber vary in the same manner and at the same
time, so that the whole tuber assumes a new character. For instance,
a single eye in a tuber of the old Forty-fold pot j.to, which is a purple
variety, was observed''^ to become white; this eye was cut out and
planted separately, and the kind has since been largely propagated.
Kemp's potato is properly white, but a plant in Lancashire produced
two tubers which were red, and tw^o which were white; the red
M. Lemoine (quoted iu ‘ Gai’d.
Chron.,’ 1867, p. 74) has lately ob-
served that the Symphytum with
variegated leaves cannot be propa-
gated by diviAon of the roots. He
also foun t that out of 500 plants of a
Phlox with striped flowers, which
had been propagated by root-division,
only seven or eight produced striped
flowers. See also, on striped Pe-
largoniums, ‘ Gard. Chron.,’ 1867,
p. 1000.
Anderson’s ‘ Recreations in Agri-
culture,’ vol. V. p. 152.
For wheat, see ‘ Improvement of
the Cereals,’ by P. Shirreff, 1873, p.
47. For maize and sugar-cane,
Carriere, ibid., ]ip. 40, 42. With
respect to the sugar-cane, Mr. J.
Caldwell, of Mauritius, says (‘ Gar-
dcufcr’.s Chronicle,’ 1874, p. 316) the
Ribbon cane has here “ sported into a
perfectly green cane and a perfectly red
cane from the same head. I verified this
myself, and saw at least 200 instances
in the same plantation, and the fact
has completely upset all our pre-
conceived ideas of the difference ot
colour being permanent. The con-
version of a striped cane into a
green cane was not uncommon, but
the change into a red cane univer-
sally disbelieved, and that both e^nts
should occur in the same plant
incredible. I find, however, in
Fleischman’s ‘ Report on Sugar Culti-
vation in Louisiana for 1818, by the
American Patent Office, the circum-
stance is mentioned, but he says he
never saw it himself.”
‘Gard. Chron.,’ 1857, p. 662.
(.3hap, XL
BY SUCKEKS, TUBERS, AND BULBS.
411
kind was propagated in tiie nsual manner by eyes, and kept true
to its new colour, and, being found a more productive variety,
soon became widely known under the name ot Tuyloi 's Forty-foliV^
The old Forty-fold potato, as already stated, is a purple variety;
but a plant long cultivated on the same ground produced, not, as in
the case above given, a single white eye, but a whole white tuber,
which has since been propagated and keeps trueJ^ Several cases
have been recorded of large portions of whole rows of potatoes
slightly changing their character
Dahlias propagated by tubers under the hot climate of St.
Domingo vary much; Sir E. Schomburgk gives the case of the
Butterfly variety,” which the second year produced on the same
plant double and single flowers; here white petals edged with
“maroon; there of a uniform deep maroon.”'^ Mr. Bree also
mentions a plant “ which bore two different kinds of self-coloured
“ flowers, as well as a third kind which partook of both colours
“ beautifully intermixed.” Another case is described of a dahlia
with purple flowers which bore a white flower streaked with
purple.'®
Considering how long and extensively many Bulbous plants
have been cultivated, and how numerous are the varieties produced
from seed, these plants have not perhaps varied so much by offsets,
—that is, by the production of new bulbs,— as might have been
expected. With the Hyacinth, however, several instances have
been given by M. Carriere. A case also has been recorded of a blue
variety which for three successive years gave offsets producing
white flowers with a red centre.®® Another hyacinth bore on the
same truss a perfectly pink and a perfectly blue flower. I have
seen a bulb producing at the same time one stalk or truss with fine
blue flowers, another with fine red flowers, and a third with blue
flowers on one side and red on the other ; several of the flowers
being also longitudinally striped red and blue.
Mr. John Scott informs me that in 1862 Imatopliyllum miniafum,
in the Botanic Gardens of Edinburgh, threw up a sucker which
differed from the normal form, in the leaves being two-ranked
instead of four-ranked. The leaves were also smaller, with the
upper surface raised instead of being channelled.
In the propagation of Tulips, seedlings are raised, called seifs or
breeders, which, “ consist of one plain colour on a white or yellow,
“bottom. These, being cultivated on a dry and rather poor soil,
“ become broken or variegated and produce nevr varieties. The
“ time that elapses before they break varies from one to twenty
‘Gard. Chrou.,’ 1841, p. 811.
Ibid., 1857, p. 613.
Ibid., 1857, p. 679. See also
Philips, ‘Ilist. of Vegetables,’ voi. ii.
p. 91, for other and similar accounts.
‘ Journal of Proc. Linn. Soc.,’
rol. ii. Botany, p. 132.
Loudon’s ‘ Gard. Mag.,’ vol. viii.,
1832, p. 94.
‘Gard. Chron.,’ 1850, p. 536;
and 1842, p. 729.
‘ Des Jacinthe f &o., Amsterdam,
1768, p. 122.
‘ Gard. Chron.,’ 1845, p. 212.
412
BUD-VARIATION.
Chap. XI.
“ years or more, and sometimes this change never takes place.”
The broken or variegated colours which give value to all tulips are
due to bud-variation ; for although the Bybloemens and some other
kinds have been raised from several distinct breeders, yet all the
Baguets are said to have come from a single breeder or seedling.
This bud-variation, in accordance with the views of MM. Vilmorin
and Verlot,^^ is probably an attempt to revert to that uniform
colour which is natural to the species. A tulip, however, which has
already become broken, when treated with too strong manure, is
liable to flush or lose by a second act of reversion its variegated
colours. ISome kinds, as Imperatrix Florum, are much more liable
than others to flushing; and Mr. Dickson maintains^'* that this can
no more be accounted for than the variation of any other plant.
He believes that English growers, from care in choosing seed
from broken flowers instead of from plain flowers, have to a
certain extent diminished the tendency in flowers already broken
to flushing or secondary reversion. Iris xiphium, according to
M. Carriere (p. 65), behaves in nearly the same manner, as do so
many tulips.
During two consecutive years all the early flowers in a bed of
Tigridia conchijlora resembled those of the old 7'. pavonia ; but
the later flowers assumed their proper colour of fine yellow, spotted
with crimson. An apparently authentic account has been published*^*^
of two forms of Hemerocallis, which have been universally con-
sidered as distinct species, changing into each other ; for the roots
of the large-flowered tawny B.fulva, being divided and planted in
a different soil and place, produced the small-flowered H. Jiava, as
well as some intermediate forms. It is doubtful whether such
cases as these latter, as well as the ‘‘ flushing ” of broken tulips and
the “ running ” of particoloured carnations, — that is, their more or
less complete return to a uniform tint, — ought to be classed under
bud-variation, or ought to be retained for the chapter in which I
treat of the direct action of the conditions of life on organic beings.
These cases, however, have this much in bud-variation, that the
change is effected through buds and not through seminal re-
production. But, on the other hand, there is this difference— that
in ordinary cases of bud-variation, one bud alone changes, whilst in
the foregoing cases all the buds on the same plant were modified
together. With the potato, we have seen an intermediate case, for
all the eyes in one tuber simultaneously changed their character.
I will conclude with a few allied cases, which may be ranked
either under bud- variation, or under the direct action of the
conditions of life. When the common Hepatica is transplanted from
Loudon^s ‘ Encyclopaedia of Gar-
dening,’ p. 1024.
‘ Production des Varietes,’ 1865,
p. 63.
‘ Gard. Chron,/ 1841, p. 782;
184-2, p. 55.
85 ‘ Gard. Chron.,’ 1849, p. 565.
8® ‘Transact. Linn. Soc.,’ vol. ii. p.
354.
Chap. XI.
GRAFT-HYBEIDS.
413
its native woods, the flowers change colour, even during the first
year.®^ It is notorious that the improved varieties of the Hearts-
ease ( Viola tricolor), when transplanted, often produce flowers widely
different in size, form, and colour : for instance, I transplanted a
large uniformly-coloured dark purple variety, whilst in full flower,
and it then produced much smaller, more elongated flowers, with
the lower petals yellow ; these were succeeded by flowers marked
with large purple spots, and ultimately, towards the end of the
same summer, by the original large dark purple -flowers, JThe
slight . changes which some fruit-trees undergo from being grafted
and regrafted on various stocks,®® were considered by Andrew
Knight®® as closely allied to “sporting branches,’’ or bud-variations.
Again, we have the case of young fruit-trees changing their
character as they grow old ; seedling pears, for instance, lose with
age their spines and improve in the flavour of their fruit. Weeping
birch-trees, when grafted on the common variety, do not acquire a
perfect pendulous habit until they grow old ; on the other hand, I
shall hereafter give the case of some weeping ashes which slowly
and gradually assumed an upright habit of growth. All such
changes, dependent on age, may be compared with the changes,
alluded to in the last chapter, which many trees naturally undergo;
as in the case of the Deodar and Cedar of Lebanon, which are
unlike in youth, whilst they closely resemble each other in old
age ; and as with certain oaks, and with some varieties of the lime
and hawthorn.®®
Graft-hybrids. — Before giving a summary on Bud- variation I
will discuss some singular and anomalous cases, wdiich are
more or less closely related to this same subject. I will
begin with the famous case of Adam’s laburnum or Gytisus
adami, a form or hj^brid intermediate between two very dis-
tinct species, namely, G. laburnum and purpureus, the common
and purple laburnum ; but as this tree has often been
described, I will be as brief as I can.
Throughout Europe, in different soils and under different climates,
Godron, ‘ De I’Esp^ce,’ tom. ii, p.
84.
M. Carrifere has lately described,
iu the ‘Kevue Horticole,* (Dec. 1,
1866, p. 457,) an extraordinary case.
He twice inserted grafts of the Aria
vestita on thorn-trees ieplnes) growing
in pots ; and the grafts, as they grew,
produced shoots with bark, buds,
leaves, petioles, petals, and flower-
stalks, all widely different from those
of the Aria. The grafted shoots were
also much hardier, and flowered
earlier, than those on the ungrafted
Aria.
‘ Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol ii. p.
160.
For the cases of oaks, see Alph.
De Candolle in ‘ Bibl. Univers.,’
Geneva, Nov. 1862; for limes, &c.,
Loudon’s ‘ Gard Mag.,’ vol. xi., 1835,
p. 503.
GRAFT-HYBRIDS.
Chap. X [.
il4
branches on this tree have repeatedly and suddenly reverted to the
two parent species in their flowers and leaves. To behold mingled
on the same tree tufts of dingy-red, bright yellow, and purple
flowers, borne on branches having widely different leaves and
manner of growth, is a surprising sight. The same raceme some-
times bears two kinds of flowers ; and I have seen a single flower
exactly divided into halves, one side being bright yellow and the
other purple; so that one half of the standard-petal was yellow and
of larger size, and the other half purple and smaller. In another
flower the whole corolla was bright yellow, but exactly half the
calyx was purple. In another, one of the dingy-red wing-petals had a
narrow bright yellow stripe on it ; and lastly, in another flower,
one of the stamens, which had become slightly foliaceous, was half
yellow and half purple; so that the tendency to segregation of
character or reversion affects even single parts and organs.®^ The
most remarkable fact about this tree is that in its intermediate
state, even when growing near both jDarent- species, it is quite
sterile ; but when the flowers become pure yellow or pure purple
they yield seed, I believe that the pods from the yellow flowers
yield a full complement of seed; they certainly yield a larger
number. Two seedlings raised by Mr. Herbert from such seed^-*^
exhibited a purple tinge on the stalks of their flowers ; but several
seedlings raised by myself resembled in every character the common
laburnum, with the exception that some of them had remarkably
long racemes : these seedlings were perfectly fertile. That such
purity of character and fertility should be suddenly reacquired
from so hybridised and sterile a form is an astonishing pheno-
menon. The branches with purple flowers appear at first sight
exactly to resemble those of G. purpureus ; but on careful com-
parison I found that they differed from the pure species in the
shoots being thicker, the leaves a little broader, and the flowers
slightly shorter, with the corolla and calyx less brightly purple:
the basal part of the standard-petal also plainly showed a trace of
the yellow stain. So that the flowers, at least in this instance, had
not perfectly recovered their true character; and in accordance
with this, they were not perfectly fertile, for many of the pods
contained no seed, some produced one, and very few contained as
m.any as two seeds ; whilst numerous pods on a tree of the pure O.
purpureus in my garden contained three, four, and five fine seeds.
The pollen, moreover, was very imperfect, a multitude of grains
being small and shrivelled; and this is a singular fact; for, as we
shall immediately see, the pollen-grains in the dingy-red and sterile
flowers on the parent-tree, were, in external appearance, in a much
* For analogous facts, see Braun,
‘ Rejuvenescence,’ in ■ Ray Soc. Bot.
]flem.,’ 1853, p. 320; and ‘Card.
Chron.,’ 1842, p. 397 ; also Braun,
in ‘ Sitzungsberichte der Ges. naUir-
forschender Freundc,’ June, 1873, p.
63.
‘ Journal of Hort. Soc.,’ vol. ii
1847, p. 100.
Ckap. XL
GKAFT-HYBRIDS.
415
better state, and included very few shrivelled grains. Although tho
pollen of the reverted purple flowers was in so poor a condition,
the ovules were well formed, and the seeds, when mature, germi-
nated freely with me. Mr. Herbert raised plants from seeds of
the reverted purple flowers, and they differed a very litth from the
usual state of C. purpureus. Some which I raised in the same
manner did not differ at all, either in the character of their flowers or
of the whole bush, from the pure C. purpureus.
Prof. Caspary has examined the ovules of the dingy-red and
sterile flowers in several plants of G. adami on the Continent,®® and
finds them generally monstrous. In three plants examined by me
in England, the ovules were likewise monstrous, the nucleus
varying much in shape, and projecting irregularly beyond the
proper coats. The pollen grains, on the other hand, judging from
their external appearance, were remarkably good, and readily pro-
truded their tubes. By repeatedly counting, under the microscope,
the proportional number of bad grains, Prof. Caspary ascertained
that only 2‘5 per cent, were bad, which is a less proportion than in
the pollen of three pure species of Cytisus in their cultivated state,
viz., G. purpureus, laburnum, and alpinus. Although the pollen of
G. adami is thus in appearance good, it does not follow, accord-
ing to M. Xaudin’s observation®"^ on Mirabilis, that it would be
functionally effective. The fact of the ovules of G. adami being
monstrous, and the pollen apparently sound, is all the more re-
markable, because it is opposed to what usually occurs not only
with most hybrids,®^ but with two hybrids in the same genus,
namely in G. purpureo-elongatus, and G. dljiino-lahurnum. In both
these hybrids, the ovules, as observed by Prof Caspary and my?elf,
were well-formed, whilst many of the pollen-grains were ill-formed;
in the latter hybrid 20’3 per cent., and in the former no less than
84‘8 per cent, of the grains were ascertained by Prof Caspary to be
bad. This unusual condition of the male and female reproductive
elements in G. a<iami has been used by Prof Caspary as an argu-
ment against this plant being considered as an ordinary hybrid
produced from seed ; but wm should remember that with hybrids
the ovules have not been examined nearly so frequently as the
Xiollen, and they may be much oftener imperfect than is generally
supposed. Hr. E. Bornet, of Antibes, informs me (through Mr. J.
Traherne Moggridge) that with hybrid Cisti the ovarium is fre-
quently deformed, the ovules being in some cases quite absent, and
in other cases incapable of fertilisation.
Several theories have been propounded to account for the origin
of G. adami, and for the transformations which it undergoes. Tho
See ‘ Transact, of Hort. Congress ‘ Nouvelles Archives du Mu-
of Amsterdam,’ 1865 ; but I owe seum,’ tom. i. p. 143.
most of the following information to See on this head, Naudin, ibid.,
Prof. Caspary’s letters. p. 141.
416
GRAFT-IIYBIIIDS.
Chap. XT.
whole case has been attributed by some authors to bud-variation ;
but considering the wide ditFercnce between G. hhurnum and
jmrpureus, both of which are natural species, and considering the
sterility of the intermediate form, this view may be summarily
rejected. We shall presently see that, with hybrid plants, two
embryos differing in their characters may be developed within the
same seed and cohere ; and it has been supposed that C. adami
tlius originated. Many botanists maintain that C. odami is a
hybrid produced in the common way by seed, and that it has
reverted by buds to its two parent-forms. Negative results are not
of much value; but Reisseck, Caspary, and myself, tried in vain to
cross G. lahurnum oxidi purpurms ; when I fertilised the former with
pollen of the latter, I had the nearest approach to success, for pods
were formed, but in sixteen days after the withering of the flowers,
they fell off. Nevertheless, the belief that G. adami is a spon-
taneously produced hybrid between these two species is supported
by the fact that such hybrids have arisen in this genus. In a bed
of seedlings from (\ elongatus, which grew near to G. purpureas, and
was probably fertilised by it through the agency of insects (for
these, as I know by experiment, play an important part in the fer-
tilisation of the laburnum), the sterile hybrid G. purpureo-elongatus
appeared.®® Thus, also, Waterer’s laburnum, the G. alpmc-labur-
num^'^ spontaneously appeared, as I am informed by Mr. Waterer,
in a bed of seedlings.
On the other hand, we have a clear and distinct account given to
Poiteau,®® by M. Adam, who raised the plant, showing that G. adami
is not an ordinary hybrid; but is what may be called a graft-hybrid,
that is, one produced from the united cellular tissue of two distinct
species. M. Adam inserted in the usual manner a shield of the
bark of G. purpureus into a stock of G. laburnum ; and the bud lay
dormant, as often happens, for a year ; the shield then produced
many buds and shoots, one of which grew more upright and
vigorous with larger leaves than the shoots of G. purpureus, and
Braun, in ‘ Bot. Mem. Ray. Soc.,’
1853, p. xxiii.
This hybrid has never been de-
scribed. It is exactly intermediate in
foliage, time of flowering, dark striae
at the base of the standard petal,
hairiness of the ovarium, and in
almost every other character, b^'-
tween C. la'iurnum and alpinus ; but
it approaches the former species more
nearly in colour, and exceeds it in
the length of the racemes. We have
before seen that 20-3 per cent, of its
pollen-grains are ill-formed and
worthless. My plant, though grow-
ing not above thirty or forty yards
from both parent-species, during some
seasons yielded no good seeds ; but in
1866 it was unusually fertile, and its
long racemes produced from one to
occasionally even four pods. Many
of the pods contained no good seeds,
b’-'t generally they contained a single
apparently good seed, sometimes two,
and in one case three seeds. Some of
theso seeds germinated, and 1 raised
two trees from them ; one resembles
the present form; the other has a
remarkable dwarf character with
small leaves, but has not yet tlowered
‘ Annalesde la Soc. de I’Hort. de
Paris,’ tom. vii., 1830, p. 93.
Chap. XL
GRAFT-HYBRIDS.
417
was consequently propagated. Now it deserves especial notice that
these plants were sold by M. Adam, as a variety of C. purpureus,
before they had flowered; and the account was published by
Poiteau after the plants had flowered, but before they had ex-
hibited their remarkable tendency to revert into the two parent
species. So that there v/as no conceivable motive for falsification,
and it is difficult to see how there could have been any error.®^ If
we admit as true M. Adam’s account, we must admit the extra-
ordinary fact that two distinct species can unite by their c^ular
tissue, and subsequently produce a plant bearing leaves and sterile
flowers intermediate in character between the scion and stock, and
producing buds liable to reversion ; in short, resembling in every
important respect a hybrid formed in the ordinary way by seminal
reproduction.
I will therefore give all the facts which I have been able to
collect on the formation of hybrids between distinct species
or varieties, without the intervention of the sexual organs. F or
if, as I am now convinced, this is possible, it is a most im-
portant fact, which will sooner or later change the views held
by ph3^siologists with respect to sexual reproduction. A
sufficient body of facts will afterwards be adduced, showing
that the segregation or separation of the characters of the
two parent-forms by bud-vaiiation, as in the case of Cyiisus
adami, is not an unusual though a striking phenomenon.
We shall further see that a whole bud may thus revert, or
only half, or some smaller segment.
The famous hizzarria Orange offers a strictly parallel case to that
of Cytisns adami. The gardener who in 1644 in Florence raised
this tree, declared that it was a seedling which had been grafted ;
and after the graft had perished, the stock sprouted and produced
the bizzarria. Gallesio, who carefully examined several living
specimens and compared them with the description given by the
original describer, P. Nato,^®® states that the tree produces at the same
time leaves, flowers, and fruit identical with the bitter orange and
with the citron of Florence, and likewise compound fruit, with the
two kinds either blended together, both externally and internally,
An account was given in th& ‘ Gar-
dener’s Chronicle ’ (1857, pp. 382, dOO)
of a common laburnum on which grafts
of C. purpureus had been inserted, and
which grainally assumed the charac-
ter of C. adami; but t have little
doubt that C. adami had been sold to
the purchaser, who was not a botanist,
»u the place of C. purpureus. I have
28
ascertained that this occurred in
another instance.
Gallesio, ‘ Gli Agrumi dei Giard.
Bot. Agrar. di. Firenze,’ 1839, p. 11.
In his ‘Traite du Citrus,’ 1811, p.
146, he speaks as if the compound
fruit consisted in part of a lemon, but
this apparently was a mistake.
418
GRAFT-HYBRIDS
Chap. XI.
or segregated in various ways. This tree can be propagated by
cuttings, and retains its diversifted character. The so-called tri-
facial orange of Alexandria and Smyrna resembles in its general
nature the bizzarria, and differs only in the orange being of the
sweet kind ; this and the citron are blended together in the same
fruit, or are separately produced on the same tree ; nothing is
known of its origin. In regard to the bizzarria, many authors
believe that it is a graft-hybrid; Gallesio, on the other hand, thinks
that it is an ordinary hybrid, with the habit of partially revert-
ing by buds to the two parent-forms ; and we have seen that the
species in this genus often cross spontaneously.
It is notorious that when the variegated Jessamine is budded on
the common kind, the stock sometimes produces buds bearing
variegated leaves: Mr. Rivers, as he informs me, has seen instances
of this. The same thing occurs with the Oleander.^*^^ Mr. Rivers,
on the authority of a trustworthy friend, states that some buds of
a golden- variegated ash, which were inserted into common ashes,
all died except one ; but the ash-stocks were aff'ected,^'^^ and pro-
duced, both above and below the points of insertion of the plates
of bark bearing the dead buds, shoots which bore variegated leaves.
Mr. J. Anderson JHenry has communicated to me a nearly similar
case : Mr. Brown, of Perth, observed many years ago, in a Highland
glen, an ash-tree with yellow leaves ; and buds taken from this tree
were inserted into common ashes, which in consequence were affected,
and produced the Blotched Breadulhane A^h. This variety has been
propagated, and has preserved its character during the last fifty
years. Weeping ashes, also, were budded on the affected stocks,
and became siruilarly variegated. It has been repeatedly proved
that several species of Abutilon, on which the variegated A. thompsovii
has been grafted, become variegated.^^
Many authors consider variegation as the result of disease ; and the
foregoing cases may be looked at as the direct result of the inoculation
of a disease or some weakness. This has been almost proved to be
the case by Morren in the excellent paper just referred to, who shows
that even a leaf inserted by its footstalk into the bark of the stock
is sufficient to communicate variegation to it, though the leaf
soon perishes. Even fully formed leaves on the stock of Abuti-
lon are sometimes affected by the graft and become variegated.
VAriegation is much influenced, as we shall hereafter see, by the
nature of the soil in which the plants are grown ; and it does not
‘ Gsrd. Chron.,’ 1855, p.. 628.
Bee also Prof. Caspary, in ‘Transact,
llort. Congress of Amsterdam,’ 1865.
Gartner (‘ Bastarderzengung,’ s,
611) gives many references on this
subject.
A nearly similar account was
given by Brabley. in 1724, in his
‘Treatise on Husbandry,’ vol. i. p.
199
1®’^ Mcrren, ‘ Bull, de I’Acad. R. dea
Sciences de Belgique,’ 2de series,
tom. xxviii., 1869, p. 434. Also Mag-
nus, ‘ Gesellschaft liaturforschender
Freunde, Berlin,’ Feb. 21, 1871, p
13: ibid., June 21, 1870, and Oct. 17,
1871. Also ‘ Bot. Zeitung,’ Feb. 24,
1871.
Chap. XI.
GEAFT-HYBRIDS.
419
seem improbable that whatever change in the sap or tissues certain
soils induce, whether or not called a disease, might spread from the
inserted piece of bark to the stock. But a change of this kind
cannot be considered to be of the nature of a graft-hybrid.
There is a variety of the hazel with dark-purple leaves, like those
of the copper-beech : no one has attributed this colour to disease,
and it apparently is only an exaggeration of a tint wdiich may often
be seen on the leaves of the common hazel. When this variety is
grafted on the comm.on hazel, it sometimes colours, as has4)een
asserted, the leaves below the graft ; although negative evidence is
not of much value, I may add that Mr. Rivers, w'ho lias possessed
hundreds of such grafted trees, has never seen an instance.
Gartner quotes two separate accounts of branches of dark and
white-fruited vines which had been united in various ways, such
as being split longitudinally, and then joined, &c. ; and these
branches produced distinct bunches of grapes of the tw'o colours,
and other bunches with berries, either striped, or of an intermediate
and new tint. Even the leaves in one case wero variegated. These
facts are the more remarkable because Andrew Kniglit never suc-
ceeded in raising variegated grapes by fertilising white kinds by
pollen of dark kinds ; though, as we have seen, he obtained seed-
lings with variegated fruits and leaves, by fertilising a white variety
by the already variegated dark Aleppo grape. Gartner attributes
the above-quoted cases merely to bud- variation ; but it is a strange
coincidence that the branches which had been grafted in a peculiar
manner should alone thus have varied ; and H. Adorne de Tscharner
positively asserts that he produced the described result more than
once, and could do so at will, by splitting and uniting the branches
in the manner described by him.
I should not have quoted the following case had not the author
of ‘Des Jacinthes ’ impressed me with the belief not only of his
extensive knowledge, but of his truthfulness: he says that bulbs of
blue and red hyacinths may be cut in two, and that they will grow
together and throw up a united stem (and this I have myself seen)
with flowers of the two colours on the opposite sides. But the
remarkable point is, that flowers are sometimes produced with the
two colours blended together, which makes the case closely analogous
with that of the blended colours of the grapes on the united vine
branches.
In the case of roses it is supposed that several graft-hybrids have
been formed, but there is much doubt about these cases, owing to
the frequency of ordinary bud-variations. The most trustworthy
instance known to me is one, recorded by Mr. Poynter,^®^ who
assures me in a letter of the entire accuracy of the statement. Jiom
devoniensis had been budded some years previously on a white
Loudon’s ‘Arborotum,’ vol. iv. Amsterdam, 1768, p. 124.
p. 2595. ‘Gard. Chron.,’ 1860, p. 672,
‘ Bastarderzeugung,’ s. 619. with a woodcut.
420
GrwVFT-HYBRlDS.
Chap. XT.
l^aiiksian rose; and from the much enlarged point of junction,
whence the Devoniensis and Jhanksian still continued to grow, a
third bi'anch issued, which was neither pure Banksian nor pure
Devoniensis, but partook of the character of both; the flowers
resembled, but were superior in character to those of the variety
called Lamirque (one of the Noisettes), while the shoots were similar
in their manner of growth to those of the Banksian rose, with the
exception that the longer and more robust shoots were furnished
with prickles. This rose was exhibited before the Floral Committee
of the Horticultural Society of London. Dr. Bindley examined it
and concluded that it had certainly been produced by the mingling
of R. hanksicB with some rose like R. deooniensis, “ for while it was
very greatly increased in vigour and in size of all the parts, the
leaves were half-way between a Banksian and Tea-scented rose.”
It appears that rose-growers were previously aware that the Banksian
rose sometimes affects other roses. As Mr. Poynter's new variety is
intermediate in its fruit and foliage between the stock and scion,
and as it arose from the point of junction between the two, it is very
improbable that it owes its origin to mere bud-variation, indepen-
dently of the mutual influence of the stock and scion.
Lastly, with respect to potatoes. Mr. E. Trail stated in 1867
before the Botanical Society of Edinburgh (and has since given me
fuller information), that several years ago lie cut about sixty blue
and white potatoes into halves through the eyes or buds, and then
carefully joined them, destroying at the same time the other eyes.
Some of these united tubers produced white, and others blue tubers ;
some, however, produced tubers partly white and partly blue;
and the tubers from about four or five were regularly mottled with
the two colours. In these latter cases we may conclude that a stem
had been formed by the union of the bisected buds, that is, by graft-
hybridisation.
In the 'Botanische Zeitung’ (May 16, 1868), Professor Hildebrand
gives an account with a coloured ligure, of his experiments on two
varieties which were found during the same season to be constant
in character, namely, a somewhat elongated rough-skinned red potato
and a rounded smooth white one. He inserted buds reciprocally into
both kinds, destroying the other buds. He thus raised two plants,
and each of these produced a tuber intermediate in character
between the two parent-forms. That from the red bud grafted
into the white tuber, was at one end red and rough, as the whole
tuber ought to have been if not affected ; in the middle it was
smooth with red stripes, and at the other end smooth and altogether
white like that of the stock.
Mr. Taylor, who had received several accounts of potatoes having
been grafted by ^vedge-shaped pieces of one variety inserted into
another, though sceptical on the subject, made twenty-four experi-
ments which he described in detail before the Horticultural Society.
See ‘ GarJ. Chron.,’ 1869, p. 220.
Chap. XI.
GRAFT-HYBRIDS.
421
He thus raised many new varieties, some like the graft or like the
stock* others having an intermediate character. Several persons
witn erased the digging up of the tubers from these graft-hybrids;
and one of them, Mr. Jameson, a large dealer in potatoes, writes
thus, “ They were such a mixed lot, as 1 have never before or since
seer,,. They were of all colours and shapes, some very ugly and
“ some very handsome.” Another witness says some were round,
“ some kidney, pink-eyed kidney, piebald, and mottled red and
‘* purple, of all shapes and sizes.” Some of these varieties have
lieen found valuable, and have been extensively propagated,
Mr. Jameson took away a large piebald potato which he cut into
five sets and propagated ; these yielded round, white, red, and pie-
bald potatoes.
Mr. Fitzpatrick followed a different p]an;^^° he grafted togethei
not the tubers but the young stems of varieties producing black,
white, and red potatoes. The tubers borne by three of these twin
or united plants were coloured in an extraordinary manner; one
was almost exactly half black and half white, so that some persons
on seeing it thought that two potatoes had been divided and re-
joined; other tubers were half red and half white, or curiously
mottled with red and white, or with red and black, according
to the colours of the graft and stock.
The testimony of Mr. Fenn is of much value, as he is "a well
known potato- grower” who has raised many new varieties by crossing
different kinds in the ordinary manner. He considers it “ demon-
strated” that new, intermediate varieties can be produced by
grafting the tubers, though he doubts whether such will prove
valuable.^^^ He made many trials and laid the results, exhibiting
specimens, before the Horticultural Society. Not only were the
tubers affected, some being smooth and white at one end, and
rough and red at the other, but the stems and leaves were modified
in their manner of growth, colour and precocity. Some of these
graft-hybrids after being propagated for three years still showed in
their haulms their new character, different from that of the kind
from which the eyes had been taken. Mr. Fenn gave twelve of the
tubers of the third generation to Mr. Alex. Dean, who grew them,
and was thus converted into a believer in graft-hybridisation,
having previously been a complete sceptic. For comparison he
planted the pure parent-forms alongside the twelve tubers ; and
found that many of the plants from the latter were intermediate
between the two parent-forms in precocity, in the tallness, up-
rightness, jointing, and robustness of the stems, and in the size and
colour of the leaves.
Another experimentalist, Mr. Eintoul, grafted no less than fifty-nine
tubers, which differed in shape (some being kidneys) in smoothness
‘ Gard. Chron.,’ 1869, p. 335. hesion of the united wedges. Sec
‘ Gard. Chron.,’ 1869, p. 1018, with also ibid., 1870, pp. 1277, 128.3.
remarks by Dr. Masters on the ad- ‘ Gard. Chr jn.,’ 1871, p. 837.
422
GRAFT-HYBRIDS.
Chap. XI.
and colour and many of the plants thus raised were intermediate
“ in the tubers as well as in the haulms.” He describes the more
striking cases.
In 1871 I received a letter from Mr. Merrick, of Boston, U.S.A.,
who states that, “ Mr. Fearing Burr, a very careful experimenter and
author of a much valued book, ‘ The Garden Vegetables cf
“ America,’ has succeeded in producing distinctly mottled and
most curious potatoes — evidently graft-hybrids, by inserting eyes
** from blue or red potatoes into the substance of white ones, after
removing the eyes of the latter. I have seen the potatoes, and
they are very curious.”
We will now turn to the experiments made in Germany, since
the publication of Prof. Hildebrand’s paper. Herr Magnus relates"^
the results of numerous trials made by Herren Eeuier and Linde-
muth, both attached to the Royal Gardens of Berlin. They inserted
the eyes of red potatoes into white ones, and vice verm. Many-
different forms partaking of the characters of the inserted bud and
of the stock were thus obtained; for instance, some of the tubers
were white with red eyes.
Herr Magnus also exhibited in the following year before the same
Society (Nov. 19, 1872), the produce of grafts between black, white,
and red potatoes, made by Dr. Neubert. These were made by
uniting not the tubers but the young stems, as was done by Mr.
Fitzpatrick. The result was remarkable, inasmuch as all the
tubers thus produced were intermediate in character, though in a
variable degree. Those between the black and the white or the red
were the most striking in appearance. Some from between the
white and red had one half of one colour and the other half of the
other colour.
At the next meeting of the society Herr Magnus communicated
the results of Dr. Heimann’s experiments in grafting together the
tubers of red Saxon, blue, and elongated white potatoes. The eyes
were removed by a cylindrical instrument, and inserted into corre-
sponding holes in other varieties. The plants thus produced yielded
a great number of tubers, which were intermediate between the two
parent-forms in shape, and in the colour both of the flesh and skin.
Herr Reuter experimented,^^® by inserting wedges of the elongated
White Mexican potato into a Black Kidney potato. Both sorts are
known to be very constant, and differ much not only in form and
colour, but in the eyes of the Black Kidney being deeply sunk,
whereas those of the White Mexican are superficial and of a
different shape. The tubers produced by these hybrids were
intermediate in colour and form; and some which resembled in
form the graft, i.e. the Mexican, had eyes deeply sunk and of the
same shape as in the stock or Black Kidney.
‘ Card. Chron.,’ 1870, p. 1506. Berlin,’ Oct. 17, 1871.
‘ Sitzungsbe'ichte der Gesell- Ibitl., Nov. 17, 1874-. ^ also
schaft uaturforschender Freunde zu excolleut remarks by Herr Magnus.
Chap. XI.
GRAFT-HYBRIDS.
423
Any one who will attentively consider the abstract now
given, of the experiments made by many observers in several
countries, will, I think, be convinced that by grafting two
varieties of the potato together in various ways, hybridised
plants can be produced. It should be observed that several
of the experimentalists are scientific horticulturists, and
some of them potato-growers on a large scale, who, I hough
beforehand sceptical, have been fully convinced of the possi •
bility, even of the ease, of making graft-hybrids. The only
way of escaping from this conclusion is to attribute all the
many recorded cases to simple bud- variation. Undoubtedly
the potato, as we have seen in this chapter, does some-
times, though not often, vary by buds ; but it should be
especially noted that it is experienced potato-growers, whose
business it is to look out for new varieties, who have expressed
unbounded astonishment at the number of new forms produced
b}^ graft-hybridisation. It may be argued that it is merely
the operation of grafting, and not the union of two kinds,
which causes so extraordinary an amount of bud- variation ;
but this objection is at once answered by the fact tliat potatoes
are habitually propagated by the tubers being cut into pieces,
and the sole difference in the case of graft-hybrids is that
either a half or a smaller segment or a cylinder is jDlaced in
close opposition with the tissue of another variety. Moreover,
in twm cases, the young stems were grafted together, and the
plants thus united yielded the same results as when the tubers
were united. It is an argument of the greatest weight that
when varieties are produced b}^ simple bud- variation, they
frequently present quite new characters ; whereas in all the
numerous cases above given, as Herr Magnus likewise insists,
the graft-hybrids are intermediate in character between the
two forms employed. That such a result should follow if the
one kind did not affect the other is incredible.
Characters of all kinds are affected by graft hybridisaticm,
in whatever way the grafting may liave been effected. 'Fhe
plants thus raised yield tubers which partake of the wide] y
different colours, form, state of surface, position and shajie
of the vye of the parents ; and according to two careful ob-
servers they are also intermediate in certain constitutional
424
GRAFT-HYBRIDS.
Chap. XI.
peculiarities. But we should hear in mind that in all the
varieties of the potato, the tubers differ much more than any
other part.
The potato affords the best evidence of the possibility of
the formation of graft-hybrids, but we must not overlook the
account given of the origin of the famous Cytisus adami by
M. Adam, who had no conceivable motive for deception, nnd
tlie exactly parallel account of the origin of the Bizzairia
orange, namely by graft-hybridisation. Nor must the cases
be undervalued in which different varieties or species of vines,
hyacinths and roses, have been grafted together, and have
yielded intermediate forms. It is evident that graft-hybrids
can be made much more easily with some plants, as the
potato, than with others, for instance our common fruit trees ;
for these latter have been grafted by the million during many
centuries, and though the graft is often slightly affected, it
is very doubtful whether this may not be accounted for, merely
by a more or less free supply of nutriment. Nevertheless,
the cases above given seem to me to proA'e that under certain
unknown conditions graft-hj^bridisation can be effected.
Herr Magnus asserts with much truth that graft-hybrids
resemble in all respects seminal hybrids, including their
great diversity of character. Inhere is, however, a partial
exception, inasmuch as the characters of the two parent forms
are not often homogeneously blended together in graft-hybrids,
ddiey much more commonly appear in a segregated condition,
■ — that is, in segments either at first, or subsequently
through reversion. It would seem that the reproductive
elements are not so completely blended by grafting as by
sexual generation. But segregation of this kind occurs by no
means rarely, as will be immediately shown, in seminal
hybrids. Finally it must, I think, be admitted that we learn
from the foregoing cases a highly important physiological fact,
namely, that the elements that go to the production of a new
being, are not necessarily formed b}^ the male and female organs.
I'hey are present in the cellular tissue in such a state that they
can unite without the aid of the sexual organs, and thus give
rise to a new bud partaking of the characters of the two
parent forms.
UllAP. XI.
SEGREGATION OF CHARACTERS.
4^5
On the segregation of the parental characters in seminal hybrids
by bud-variation. — I will now give a sufficient number of
cases to show that segregation of this kind, namely, by buds,
may occur in ordinary hybrids raised from seed.
Hybrids were raised by Gartner between TropcBolum minus and
majas^^^ which at first produced flowers intermediate in size, colour,
and structure between their two parents; but later in the season
some of these plants produced flowers in all respects like those of
the mother-form, mingled with flowers still retaining the usual
intermediate condition. A hybrid Cereus between C. speciosissimus
and phyllanthusf^ plants which are widely different in appearance,
produced for the first three years angular, five-sided stems, and
then some flat stems like those of C. phyllanthus. K51reuter also
gives cases of hybrid Lobelias and Verbascums, which at first
produced flowers of one colour, and later in the season, flowers of a
different colour.^^® Naudin raised forty hybrids from Ikdaru^
Icevis fertilised by I), stramouium ; and three of these hybrids
produced many capsules, of which a half, or quarter, or lesser
segment was smooth and of small size, like the capsule of the pure
i). icevis, the remaining part being spinose and of larger size, like
the capsule of the pure D. stramonium : from one of these com-
posite capsules, plants perfectly resembling both parent-forms were
raised.
Turning now to varieties. A seedling apple, conjectured to be of
crossed parentage, has been described in France, which bears
fruit with one half larger than the other, of a red colour, acid taste,
and peculiar odour ; the other side being greenish-yellow and very
sweet : it is said scarcely ever to include perfectly developed seed.
I suppose that this is hot the same tree as that which Gaudichaud
exhibited before the French institute, bearing on the same branch
two distinct kinds of apples, one a reinetie rouge, and the other like a
reinette Canada jaundtre : this double-bearing variety can be propa-
gated by grafts, and continues to produce both kinds ; its origin is
unknown The Eev. J. D. La Touche sent me a coloured drawing
of an apple which he brought from Canada, of which half, surround-
ing and including the whole of the calyx and the insertion of the
foot-stalk, is green, the other half being brown and of the nature
of the pomme gris apple, with the line of separation between the two
‘ Bastarderzeugung,' 3. 549. It
I?, however, doubtful whether these
{.1-ants should be ranked as species or
varieths.
Gartner, ibid., s. 550.
‘ Journal de Physique,’ tom.
Kxiri., 1873, p. 100. ‘Act. Acad.
St. Pelersburgh,’ 1781, part i. p. 249.
‘ Nouvelles ArchAes du Mu-
seum,’ tom. i. p. 49.
L’Hermes, Jan. 14, 1837,
quoted in Loudon’s ‘ Gard. Mag.,’
vol. xiii. p. 230.
‘ Comptes Eendus,’ tom. rxxiir,,
1852, p. 746.
426
SEGREGATION OF CHARACTERS.
CilAP. XI.
halves exactly defined. The tree was a grafted one, and Mr. lia
Touche tliinks tliat tlie branches which bore this curious apjiie
sprung from the point of junction of the graft and stock; liad this
fact been ascertained, the case would probably have come into tho
class of graft-hybrids already given. But the branch may have
S-pi-ung from the stock, which no doubt was a seedling.
Prof. H. Lecoq, who has made a great number of crossings
1/etween the differently coloured varieties of Mirabilis
finds that in the seedlings the colours rarely combine, but form
distinct stripes ; or half the flower is of one colour and half of a
different colour. Some varieties regularly bear flowers striped with
yellow, white, and red ; but plants of such varieties occasionally
produce on the same root branches with uniformly coloured flowers
of all three tints, and other branches with half-and-half coloured
floAvers, and others with marbled flowers. Gallesio^^^ crossed recipro-
cally white and red carnations, and the seedlings were striped; but
some of the striped plants also bore entirely Avhite and entirely red
flowers. Some of these plants produced one year red flowers alone,
and in the following year striped flowers ; or conA’ersely, some plants,
after having borne for two or three years striped flowers, would
revert and bear exclusively red flowers. It may be worth mention-
ing that I fertilised the Furple bwtet-pea {Lathyrus odoratus) with
pollen from the light-coloured FuinUd Lady : seedlings raised from
the same pod Avere not intermediate in character, but perfectly
resembled either parent. Later in the summer, the plants Avhich
had at first borne flowers identical A\uth those of the Fainted Lady,
produced flowers streaked and blotched with purple ; shoAving in
these darker marks a tendency to reversion to the mother- variety.
Andrew Knight fertilised tAvo white grapes with pollen of the
Aleppo grape, which is darkly variegated both in its leaves and
fruit. The result was that the young seedlings Avere not at first
variegated, but all became variegated during the succeeding sum-
mer; besides this, many produced on the same plant bunches of
grapes Avhich were all black, or all white, or lead -coloured striped
with white, or white dotted Avith minute black stripes ; and grapes
of all these shades could frequently be found on the same foot-
stalk.
I will append a very curious case, not of bud-variation, but of two
cohering embryos, different in character and contained within the
same seed. A distinguished botanist, Mr. G. H. TliAvaites,^^^ states
that a seed from Fuchsia coccinea fertilised by F.fuLyens, contained
two embryos, and Avas “ a true vegetable tAvin.” The two plants pro-
duced from the two embryos Avere extremely different in appear-
ance and character,’’ though both resembled other hybrids of the
‘ Geograph. Bot. de I’Europe,’
tom. iii., 1854, p. 405 ; and ‘ De la
F^condation,’ 1862, p. 302.
‘23 ‘ 'rraite du Citrus,’ 1811, p. 45.
‘2^ ‘ Transact. Linn. Soc.,’ vol. ix,
p. 268.
‘25 ‘ Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hitt..
March, 1848
Chap. XL DIEECT ACTION OF THE MALE ELEMENT. 427
same parentage produced at the same time. These twin plants
were closely coherent, below the two pairs of cotyledon-leaves,
“ into a single cylindrical stem, so that they had subsequently the
“ appearance of being branches on one trunk.” Had the two
united stems grown up to their full height, instead of dying, a
curiously mixed hybrid would have been produced. A mongrel
melon described by Sageret^^® may perhaps have thus originated ; for
the two main branches, which arose from two cotyledon-buds, pro-
duced very different fruit, — on the one branch like that of the paternal
variety, and on the other branch like to a certain extent that of the
maternal variety, the melon of China.
In most of these cases of crossed varieties, and in some of
the cases of crossed species, the colours proper to both parents
appeared in the seedlings, as soon as they first flowered, in the
form of stripes or larger segments, or as whole flowers or fruit
of different kinds borne on the same plant ; and in this case
the appearance of the two colours cannot strictly be said to be
due to revershii, but to some incapacity of fusion. When,
however, the later flowers or fruit produced during the same
season, or during a succeeding year or generation, become
stri[ied or half-and-half, &c., the segregation of the two colours
is strictly a case of reversion by bud-variation. Whether all
the many recorded cases of striped flt^wers and fruit are duo
to previous hybridisation and reversion is by no means clear,
for instance with peaches and nectarines, moss-roses, Ac. In
a future chapter I shall show that, with animals of crossed
parentage, the same individual has been known to change its
character during growth, and to revert to one of its parents
which it did not at first resemble. Finally, from the various
facts now given, there can be no doubt that the same individual
plant, whether a hybrid or a mongrel, sometimes returns in
its leaves, flowers, and fruit, either wholly or by segments, to
both parent-forms.
On the direct or immediate action of the male element on the
mother form, — Another remarkable class of facts must be here
considered, firstly, because they have a high physiological im-
portance, and secondly, because they have been supposed to
account for some cases of bud-variation. I refer to the direct
128 ‘ Pomologle Physiolog.,’ 1830, p. 126.
423
ON THE DIRECT ACTION OP THE
Chap. XI
action of the male element, not in the ordinary Avay on the
ovules, hut on certain parts of the female plant, or in case of
animals on the suhsequent progeny of the female by a second
male. I may premise that with plants the ovarium and tlie
coats of the ovules are obviously parts of the female, and it
could not have been anticipated that they would have been
affected b}" the pollen of a foreign variety or species, although
the develrpment of the embryo, inside the embryonic sack,
inside the ovule and ovarium, of course, depends on the male
element.
Even as long ago as ,1729 it was observed that Avhite and blue
varieties of the Pea, when planted near eachother, m at nail y crossed,
no doubt through the agency of bees, and in the an t a inn blue and
white peas were found within the same pods. Wiegmann made an
exactly similar observation in the present century. The same
result has followed several times when a variety with peas of one
colour has been artiffcially crossed by a differently- coloured variety
't hese statements led Gartner, who was highly sceptical on the
subject, carefully to try a long series of experiments : he selected the
most constant varieties, and the result conclusively showed that the
colour of the skin of the pea is modified when pollen of a differently
coloured variety is used. This conclusion has since been confirmed
by experiments made by the Eev. J. M. Berkeley
Mr. Laxton of Stamford, whilst making experiments on peas for the
express purpose of ascertaining the influence of foreign pollen on
the mother-plant, has recently observed an important additional
fact. He fertilised the Tall Sugar-pea, which bears very thin green
j)ods, becoming brownish-white when dry, with pollen of the
Purple-podded pea, which, as its name expresses, has dark-purple
pods with very thick skin, becoming pale reddish purple when dry.
Mr. Laxton has cultivated the tall sugar-pea during twenty years,
and has never seen or heard of it producing a purple pod : neverthe-
less, a flower fertilised by pollen from the purple- pod yielded a pod
clouded with purplish-red which Mr. Laxton kindly gave to me.
A space of about two inches in length towards the extremity of the
pod, and a smaller space near the stalk, were thus coloured. On
comparing the colour with that of the purple pod, both pods having-
been first dried and then soaked in water, it was found to be identi-
cally the same ; and in both the colour was confined to the cells lying
ii imediately beneath the outer skin of the pod. The valves of the
‘ Fliiiosophical Transact.,’ voi.
Jt-iii., 1744-46, p. 525.
Sir. Goss, in -Transact. Hort.
S(x /ol. V. p. 2ot : and Gartner,
‘ Bastarderzeugung,’ 1849, ss. 81 and
499.
*2® ‘Garl. Chron.,’ 1854, p. 404.
Ibid., 1800, p. 900.
ChaP. XL MALE ELEMENT ON THE MOTHER-FCKM. 429
crossed pod were also decidedly thicker and stronger than those of
the pods of the mother-plant, but this may possibly have been an
accidental circumstance, for I know not how far their thickness is a
variable cliaracter in the Tall Sugar-pea.
The peas of the Tall Sugar- pea, when dry, are pale greenish-
brown, thickly covered with dots of dark purple so minute as to be
visible only through a lens, and Mr. Lax ton has never seen or heard
of this variety producing a purple pea ; but in the crossed pod one of
the peas was of a uniform beautiful violet-purple tint; and a second
was irregularly clouded with pale purple. The colour lies in the
outer of the two coats which surround the pea. As the peas of the
purple-podded variety when dry are of a pale greenish-buff, it would
at first appeal that this remarkable change of colour in the peas in
the crossed pod could not have been caused by the direct action of
the pollen of the purpie-pod : but when we bear in mind that this
latter variety has purple flowers, purple marks on its stipules, and
purple pods; and that the Tall Sugar-pea likewise has purple flowers
and stipules, and microscopically minute purple dots on the peas,
we can hardly doubt that the tendency to the production of purple
in both parents has in combination modified the colour of the peas
in the crossed pod. After having examined these specimens, 1
crossed the same two varieties, and the peas in one pod but not the
pods themselves, were clouded and tinted with purplish- red in a
much more conspicuous manner than the peas in the uncrossed
pods produced at the same time by the same plants. I may notice
as a caution that Mr. Laxton sent me various other crossed peas
slightly, or even greatly, modified in colour; but the change in
these cases was due, as had been suspected by Mr. Laxton, to the
altered colour of the cotyledons, seen through the transparent coats
of the peas ; and as the cotyledons are parts of the embryo, these
cases are not in any way remarkable.
Turning now to the genus Matthiola. The pollen of one kind of
stock sometimes affects the colour of the seeds of another kind, used
as the mdther-plant. I give the following case the more readily,
as Gartner doubted similar statements previously made with respect
to the stock by other observers. A well-known horticulturist,
Major Trevor Clarke, informs me^^^ that the seeds of the large red-
flowered biennial stock, Matthiola annua {Gocardeau of the French),
are light brown, and those of the purple branching Queen stock
{M. incKiiu) are violet-black; and he found that, when flowers of
the red stock were fertilised by pollen from the purple stock, they
yielded about fifty per cent, of black seeds. He sent me four pods
from a red flowered plant, two of which had been fertilised by their
own pollen, and they included pale brown seed; and two "which
had been crossed by pollen from the purple kind, and they included
seeds all deeply tinged with black. These latter seeds yielded
'** See also a paper by this ob- Hort. and Bot. Congress of Loudon,
server, read before the International 1866.
430
ON THE DIEECT ACTION OF Tuf Chip XL
pnrple-flo-^ered plants like their father; whilst the pale hrowii
seeds yielded normal red-flowered plants; and Major Clarke, by
sowing similar seeds, has observed on a greater scale the same
result. The evidence in this case of the direct action of the pollen
of one species on the colour of the seeds of another species appears
to me conclusive.
Gallesio^^^ fertilised the flowers of an orange with pollen from the
lemon; and one fruit thus produced bore a longitudinal stripe of
peel having the colour, flavour, and other characters of the lemon.
Mr. Anderson fertilised a green-fleshed melon with pollen from a
scarlet-fleshed kind; in two of the fruits ^'a sensible change was
perceptible: and, four other fruits were somewhat altered both
internally and externally.” The seeds of the two flrst-mention('d
fruits produced plants partaking of the good properties of both
parents. In the United States, where Cucurbitaceas are largely
cultivated, it is the popular belief’^^ that the fruit is thus directly
affected by foreign pollen ; and I have received a similar statement
with respect to the cucumber in England. It is believed that
grapes have been thus affected in colour, size, and shape : in France
a pale-coloured grape had its juice tinted by the pollen of the dark-
coloured Teinturier ; in Germany a variety bore berries which were
affected by the pollen of two adjoining kinds ; some of the berries
being only partially affected or mottled.^"®
As long ago as 1751^^® it was observed that, when differently-
coloured varieties of maize grew near each other, they mutually
affected each other’s seeds, and this is now a popular belief in the
United States. Ur. Savi^®'^ tried the experiment with care : he
sowed yellow and black-seeded maize together, and on the same ear
some of the seeds were yellow, some black, and some mottled, the
differently coloured seeds being arranged irregularly or in rows.
Prof. Hildebrand has repeated the experiment^®® with the ])recaution
of ascertaining that the mother- plant was true. A kind bearing
yellow grains was fertilised with pollen of a kind having brown
grains, and two ears produced yellow grains mingled witlT others of
a dirty violet tint. A third ear had only yellow grains, but one side
of the spindle w^as tinted of a reddish-brown ; so that here we have
the important fact of the influence of the foreign pollen extending
‘Traite du Citrus,’ p. 40.
133 i Transact. Hort. Soc.,’ vol. iii.
p 318. See also vol. v. p. 65.
134 Prof. Asa Gray, ‘ Proc. Acad.
Sc Boston, vol. iv., 1860, p. 21. I
have received statements to the same
effect from other persons in the United
States.
'35 por the French case, see ‘ Jonrn.
Hort. SoCi,’ vol. i. new sej-ies, 1866, p.
50. For Germany, see M. Jack,
quoted in Henfrey’s ‘ Botanical
Gazette,’ vol. i. p. 277. A case in
England has recently been alluded to
by the Rev. J. M. Berkeley before the
Hort. Soc. of London.
136 < Philosophical Transactions,’
vol. xlvii., 1751-52, p. 206.
Gallesio, ‘Teoria della Riprodu-
zione ’ 1816, p. 95.
138 < Zcitung,* May, 1868, p
326.
Chap. XL MALE ELEMENT ON THE MOTHER-FORM.
431
to the axis. Mr. Arnold, in Canada, varied the experiment in an
interesting manner: “a female flower was subjected first to the
“ action of pollen from a yellow variety, and then to that from a
white variety ; the result was an ear, each grain of which was
^'yellow below and white above.” With other plants it has
occasionally been observed that the crossed offspring show^ed the
influence of two kinds of pollen, but in this case the two kinds
affected the mother-plant.
Mr. Sabine states that he has seen the form ol the nearly
globular seed-capsule of Amaryllis vittata altered by the application
of the pollen of another species, of which the capsule has gibbous
angles. With an allied genus, a well-known botanist, Maximowicz,
has described in detail the striking results of reciprocally fertilising
Lilium hulhiferum and davuricum with each other's pollen. Each
species produced fruit not like its ovm, but almost identical with
that of the pollen-bearing species ; but from an accident only the
fruit of the latter species was carefully examined; the seeds were
intermediate in the development of their wings.^^^
Eritz Miiller fertilised Cattleya leoyoldi with pollen of Epidendron
cmnahariaum ; and the capsules contained very few seeds ; but these
presented a most wonderful appearance, which, from the description
given, two botanists, Hildebrand and Maximowicz, attribute to the
direct action of the pollen of the Epidendron^^^
Mr. J. Anderson Henry crossed Rhododendron dalhousice with
the pollen of R. nuttallii, which is one of the largest-flowered and
noblest species of the genus. The largest pod produced by the
former species, when fertilised with its own pollen, measured If inch
in length and Ih in girth; whilst three of the pods which had been
fertilised by pollen of R. nuttallii measured If inch in length and
no less than 2 inches in girth. Here the effect of the foreign pollen
was apparently confined to increasing the size of the ovarium ; but
we must be cautious in assuming, as the following case shows, that
size had been transferred from the male parent to the capsule of the
female plant. Mr. Henry, fertilised Arabis blepharophylla with pollen
of A. soyeri, and the pods thus produced, of which he was so kind
as to send me detailed measurements and sketches, were much
larger in all their dimensions than those naturally produced by
either the male or female parent-species. In a future chapter we
shall see that the organs of vegetation in hybrid plants, indepen-
See Dr, J. Stockton-Hough, m
AnKTican Naturalist,’ Jan. 1874, p,
29.
‘Transact Hort. Soc.,’ vol. v.
p 69,
‘ Bull, de I’Acad. Imp. de St.
Petersburg,’ tom. xvii. p. 275, 1872.
The author gives references to those
cases in the Solanacea) of fruit affected
by foreign pollen, but as it does nos
appear that the mother-plant was
artificially fertilised, 1 have not
entered into details.
‘ Bot. Zeitung,’ Sept. 1868, p.
631. For Maximowicz’s judgment,
see the paper last referred to.
‘ .lournal of Ih rticulture,’ Jan
20, 1863, p. 46.
4B2
ON THE DIRECT ACTION OF THE
Chap. XI
deiitly of the character of either parent, are soraeiimes developed
lo a monstrous size; and ihe increased size of the pods in the foro-
poing cases may be an analogous fact. On the other hand, M. de
Saporta informs me that an isolated female plant of Pistacin vera is
very apt to be fertilised by the pollen of neighbouring plants of
P. terehinflnis, and in this case the fruits are only half their pro])cr
size, which he attributes to the influence of the pollen of P.
ierdl'ivhus.
No case of the direct action of the pollen of one variety on another
is better authenticated or more remarkable than that of the common
apple. The fruit here consists of the lower part of the calyx and of
the upper part of the flower- peduncle^^^ in a metamorphosed con-
dition, so that the effect of the foreign pollen has extended even be-
yond the limits of the ovarium. Cases of apples thus affected were
recorded by Bradley in the early part of the last century ; and other
cases are given in old volumes of the ‘ Philosophical Transactions;’^^®
in one of these a Russeting apple and an adjoining kind mutually
affected each other’s fruit ; and in another case a smooth apple
affected a rough-coated kind. Another instance has been given
of two very different apple-trees growing close to each other, which
bore fruit resembling each other, but only on the adjoining branches.
It is, however, almost superfluous to adduce these or other cases,
after that of the St. Yalery apple, the flowers which, from the ab-
ortion of the stamens, do not produce pollen, but are fertilised by
the girls of the neighbourhood with pollen of many kinds ; and they
bear fruit, differing from one another in size, flavour, and colour,
but resembling in character the hermaphrodite kinds by which they
have been fertilised.”^^^
I have now shown, on the authority of several excellent
observers, in the case of plants belonging to widely different
orders, that the pollen of one species or variety, when applied
to the female of a distinct form, occasional!}’ causes the coats
of the seeds, the ovarium or fruit, including even the calyx
and upper part of the peduncle of the apple, and the axis
of the ear in maize, to be modified. Sometimes the whole
ovarium or all the seeds are thus affected ; sometimes only a
See on this head the high
anthoi’ity of Prof. Decaisne, in a paper
translated in ‘ .lourn. H >rt. Soc.,’ vol.
i. new series, 1866, p. 48.
Vol. xliii., 1744-45, p. 525 :
vol. xlv., 1747-48, p. 602.
‘ Transact. Hort. Soo.,’ vol. v.
pp. 65 and 68.. See, also, Pi-of.
Hildebrand, with a coloured figure,
in ‘ Bot. Zeitung,’ May 15, lo68, p.
327. Puvis also has collected, ‘ De la
Degeneration,’ 1837, p. 36) sev'eral
other instances; but it is not in a 1
cases possible to distinguish betwe* n
the direct action of foreign pollen ai d
bud-variations.
T. de Clermont-Tornerro, ip
‘ Mein, dc la 8ov, Linn, ’e Pari.s,' tom.
iii., 1825,. p. 164.
Chap. XI. MALE ELEMENT ON THE MOTHEK-FOKM.
433
certain number of the seeds, as in the case of the pea, or only
a part of the ovarium, as with the striped orange, mottled
grapes, and maize, is thus atfected. It must not be supposed
that any direct or immediate effect invariably follows the
use of foreign pollen : this is far from being the case ; nor
is it known on what conditions the result depends. Mr.
Knight expressly states that he has never seen the fruit
thus affected, though he crossed thousands of apple and other
fruit-trees.
There is not the least reason to believe that a branch which
has borne seed or fruit directly modified by foreign pollen is
itself affected, so as afterwards to produce modified buds ;
such an occurrence, from the temporal'}^ connection of the
flower with the stem, would be hardly possible. Hence, but
very few, if any, of the cases of bud-variation in the fruit of
trees, given in the early part of this chapter can be accounted
for by the action of foreign pollen ; for such fruits have
commonly been propagated by budding or grafting. It is
also obvious that changes of colour in flowers, which neces-
sarily supervene long before they are ready for fertilisation,
and changes in the shape or colour of leaves, when due to the
appearance of modified buds, can have no relation to the
action of foreign pollen.
The proofs of the action of foreign pollen on the mother-
plant have been given in considerable detail, because this
action, as we shall see in a future chapter, is of the highest
theoretical importance, and because it is in itself a remarkable
and apparently anomalous circumstance. That it is remark-
able under a physiological point of view is clear, for the
male element not only affects, in accordance with its proper
function, the germ, but at the same time various parts of the
mother-plant, in the same manner, as it affects the same part
in the seminal offspring from the same two parents. We thus
learn that an ovule is not indispensable for the reception of
the influence of the male element. But this direct action of
the male element is not so anomalous as it at first appears,
for it comes into play in the ordinary fertilisation of many
‘ Transact, of Hort. Soc.,* vol. v. p. 08.
29
434
ON THE DIIIECT ACTION OF THE
CirAP. XL
flowers. Gartner gradually increased the number of pollen
grains until he succeeded in fertilising a Malva, and has^'^'^
proved that many grains are first expended in the development,
or, as ho expresses it, in the satiation, of the pistil and ovarium.
Again, when one plant is fertilised by a widely distinct
species, it often happens that the ovarium is fully and quickly
developed without any seeds being formed ; or the coats of
the seeds are formed without any embryo being developed
within. Prof. Hildebrand, also, has lately shown that, in
the normal fertilisation of several OrchidesD, the action of
the plant’s own pollen is necessary for the development of
the ovarium ; and that this development takes place not.
only long before the pollen- tubes have reached the ovules,
but even before the placentae and ovules have been formed ;
so that with these orchids the pollen acts directly on the
ovarium. On the other hand, we must not overrate the effi-
cacy of pollen in the case of hybridised plants, tor an embryo
may be formed and its influence excite the surrounding tissues
of the mother-plant, and then perish at a very early age
and be thus overlooked. Again, it is well known that with
many i)lants the ovarium may be fully developed, though
pollen be wdiolly excluded. Lastly, Mr. Smith, the late
Curator at Kew (as I hear through Dr. Hooker), observed
with an orchid, the Bonatea speciosa, the singular fact that the
development of the ovarium could be effected by the mechanical
irritation of the stigma. Nevertheless, from the number of
the pollen-grains expended “ in the satiation of the ovarium
and pistil,” — from the generality of the formation of the
ovarium and seed-coats in hybridised plants which produce
no seeds, —and from Dr. Hildebrand’s observations on orchids,
we may admit that in most cases the swelling of the
OA'arium, and the formation of the seed-coats are at least
aided, if not wholly caused, by the direct action of the pollen,
independently of the intervention of the feitilised germ.
Therefore, in the previously given cases we have only to
‘ Beitrage zur Kenntniss der Wirkung des Pollens,’ ‘ Botanischd
Befruchtung,’ 1844, s. 347-351. Zeitung,’ No. 44 et seq., Oct. 30, 18t‘o
150 1 Die Fru'ilitbildung dsr Orchi- and Aug. 4, 1865, s. 249.
deen, ein Beweis fiir die doppelte
UiiAt. XI MALE ELEMENT ON THE MOTHEE-FOKM. 435
believe in tlie further power of pollen, when applied to a
distinct species or variety, to influence the shape, size, colour,
texture, &c., of certain parts of the mother-plant.
Turning now to the animal kiugdum. If we could imagine
the same flower to yield seeds during successive years, then it
would not be very surprising that a flower -of which the
ovarium had been modified by foreign pollen should next
year produce, when self- fertilised, offspring modified by
the previous male influence. Closely analogous cases have
actually occurred with animals. In the case often quoted
from Lord Morton, a nearly purely-bred Arabian chesnut
mare bore a hybrid to a quagga ; she w^as subsequently sent
to Sir Gore Ouseley, and produced two colts by a black Arabian
horse. These colts were partially dun-coloured, and were
striped on the legs more plainly than the real hybrid, or even
than the quagga. One of the two colts had its neck and
some other parts of its body plainly marked with stripes.
Stripes on the body, not to mention those on the legs, are ex-
tremely rare, — I speak after having long attended to the
subject, — with horses of all kinds in Europe, and are almost
unknown in the case of Arabians. But what makes the case
still more striking is that in these colts the hair of the mane
resembled that of the quagga, being short, stiff,. and upright.
Hence there can be no doubt that the quagga affected the
character of the offspring subsequently begot by the black
Arabian horse. Mr. Jenner Weir informs me of a strictly
parallel case; his neighbour Mr. Lethbridge, of Blackheath,
has a horse, bred by Lord Mostyn, which had previously
borne a foal by a quagga. This hoT se is dun with a dark
stripe down the back, faint stripes on the forehead between the
eyes, plain stripes on the inner side of the fore-legs and rather
more faint ones on the hind-legs, with no shoulder-stripe.
The mane grows much lower on the forehead than in the
horse, but not so low as in the quagga or zebra. The hoofs
are proportionally longer than in the horse, — so much s(' that
the farrier who first shod this animal, and knew nothing of
‘Philos. Transact.,’ 1821, p. 20.
436
ACTION OF MALE ELEMENT.
ClIAI>. XI.
its origin, said, “ Had I not seen I was shoeing a horse, I
should have thought I was shoeing a donkey.”
With respect to the varieties of our domesticated animals,
many similar and vsrell-authenticated facts have been pub*
lislied,^'"'-^ and others have been communicated to me, plainly
showing the influence of the first male on the progeny sub-
sequently borne by the mother to other males. It will
suffice to give a single instance, recorded in the ‘ Philosophical
I'ransactions,’ in a paper following that by Lord Morton ;
Mr. Giles put a sow of Lord Western’s black and white
Essex breed to a wild boar of a deep chesnut colour ; and
the “ pigs produced partook in appearance of both boar and
sow, but in some the chesnut colour of the boar strongly pre-
vailed.” After the boar had long been dead, the sow was
put to a boar of her own black and white breed — a kind
Di'. Alex. Harvey on ‘A re-
markable Effect of Cross-breeding,’
1851. On the ‘ Physiology of Breed-
ing,’ by Mr. Reginald Orton, 1855.
‘ Intermarriage,’ by Alex. Walker,
1837. ‘L’Heredite Naturelle,’ by
Dr. Prosper Lucas, tom. ii. p. 58.
Mr. W. Sedgwick in ‘British and
Foreign Medico-Chirurgical Review,’
1863, July, p. 183. Bronn, in his
‘ Geschichte der Natur,’ 1843, B. ii.
s. 127, has collected several cases
with respect to mares, sows, and dogs.
Mr. W. C. L. Martin (‘History of
the Dog,’ 1845, p. 104) says he can
personally vouch for the influence
of the male parent on subsequent
litters by other dogs. A French poet,
Jacques Savary, who wrote in 1665
on dogs, was aware of this singular
fact. Dr. Bowerbank has given us
the following striking case : — A black,
hairless Barbary bitch was first ac-
cidentally impregnated by a mongrel
spaniel uith long brown hair, and
she produced five puppies, three of
which were hairless and two covered
with short brown hair. The next
time she was put to a black, hairless
Barbary dog ; “ but the mischief
nad been implanted in the mother,
and again about half the litter looked
like pure Barbarys, and the other
half like the s/jorf-h aired progeny of
the first father.” 1 have given in
the text one case with pigs ; an
equally striking one has been recently
published in Germany, ‘ lllust.
Landwirth. Zeitung,’ 1868, Nov. 17,
p. 143. It is worth notice that
farmers in S. Brazil (as I hear from
Fritz Muller), and at the C. of Good
Hope (as I have heard from two
trustworthy persons) are convinced
that mares which have once borne
mules, when subsequently put to
horses, are extremely liable to pro-
duce colts, striped like a mule. Dr.
Wilckens, of Pogarth, gives (‘ Jahrbuch
Lanlwirthschaft,’ ii. 1869, p. 325)
a striking and analogous case. A
merino ram, having two small lappets
or flaps of skin on the neck, was in the
winter of 1861-62 put to several
Merino ewes, all of whom bore lambs
with similar flaps on their necks.
The ram was killed in the spring of
1862, and subsequently to his death
the ewes were put to other Merino
rams, and in 1863 to Southdown
rams, none of v/hom ever have neck
lappets : nevertheless, even as long
afterwards as 1867, several of these
ewes produced lambs bearing thase
appendages.
CHA.P. XL
SUMMAEY OF THE CHAPTEK.
437
wliich is well known to breed very true and never to show
any chesnut colour, — yet from this union the sow produced
some young pigs which were plainly marked with the same
chesnut tint as in the first litter. Similar cases have so
frequently occurred, that careful breeders avoid putting a
choice female of any animal to an inferior male, on account
of the injury to her subsequent progeny which may be
expected to follow.
Some physiologists have attempted to account for these
remarkable results from a previous impregnation, by the
imagination of the mother having been strongly affected;
but it will hereafter be seen that there are very slight grounds
for any such belief. Other physiologists attribute the result
to the close attachment and freely intercommunicating blood-
vessels between the modified embryo and mother. But the
analogy from the action of foreign pollen on the ovarium, seed-
coats, and other parts of the mother-plant, strongly supports
the belief that with animals the male element acts directly on
the female, and not through the crossed embryo. With
birds there is no close connection between the embryo and
mother; yet a careful observer, Dr. Chapuis, states that
with pigeons the infiuence of a first male sometimes makes
itself perceived in the succeeding broods ; but this statement
requires confirmation.
Conclusion and Summary of the Chapter. — The facts given in
the latter half of this chapter are well worthy of consideration,
as they show us in how many extraordinary modes the union
of one form with another may lead to the modification of the
seminal offspring or of the buds, afterwards produced.
There is nothing surprising in the ofispring of species or
varieties crossed in the ordinary manner being modified ; but
the case of two plants within the same seed, which cohere
and differ from each other, is curious. When a bud is formed
after the cellular tissue of two species or two varieties have
been united, and it partakes of the characters of both
parents, the case is wonderful. But I need not here repeat
what has been so lately said on this subject. We have
‘ Le Pigeon Voyageur Beige,’ 18G5, p. 59.
438
CONCLUSION AND SUMMARY
Chap. XL
also seen that in the case of plants the male clement may
affect in a direct manner the tissues of the mother, and
with animals may lead to the modification of her future pro-
geny. In the vegetable kingdom the offspring from a cross
between two species or varieties, whether effected by seminal
generation or by grafting, often revert, to a greater or less
degree, in the first or in a succeeding generation, to the two
parent-forms ; and this i eversion may affect the whole flower,
fruit, or leaf-bud, or only the half or a smaller segment of a
single organ. In some cases, however, such segregation of
character apparently depends on an incapacity for union rather
than on reversion, for the flowers or fruit which are first pro-
duced display by segments the characters of both parents. The
various facts here given ought to be well considered by any
one who wishes to embrace under a single point of view the
many modes of reproduction by gemmation, division, and
sexual union, the reparation of lost parts, variation, inheritance,
reversion, and other such phenomena. Towards the close of
the second volume I shall attempt to connect these facts
together by the hypothesis of pangenesis.
In the early half of the present chapter I have given a long
list of plants in which through bud-variation, that is, inde-
pendently of reproduction by seed, the fruit has suddenly
become modified in size, colour, flavour, hairiness, shape, and
time of maturity ; flowers have similarly changed in shape,
colour, in being double, and greatly in the character of the
calyx ; young branches or shoots have changed in colour, in
bearing spines and in habit of growth, as in climbing or in
Aveeping; leaA^es have changed in becoming variegated, in
shape, period of unfolding, and in their arrangement on the
axis. Buds of all kinds, whether produced on ordinary branches
or on subterranean stems, whether simple or much modified
and supplied with a stock of nutriment, as in tubers and bulbs,
are all liable to sudden variations of the same general nature.
In the list, many of the cases are certainly due to reversion
to characters not acquired from a cross, but which Avere
formerly present and have since been lost for a longer or
shorter time ; — as when a bud on a A^ariegated plant produces
plain leaves, or Avhen the A^ariously-coloured floAvers of the
Chap. XI-
OF THE CHAPTER.
439
ChrysaiitheiTmm revert to the aboriginal yellow tint. Many
other cases included in the list are probably due to the plants
being of crossed parentage, and to the buds reverting either
completely or by segments to one of the two parent-forms,
We may suspect that the strong tendency in the Chiysan”
themum to produce by bud-variation differently- coloured
flowers, results from the varieties having been at some^time
intentionally or accidentally crossed ; and this is certainly
the case with some kinds of Pelargonium. So it may be to a
large extent with the bud- varieties of the Dahlia, and with
the “ broken colours ” of Tulips. When, however, a plant
reverts by bud-variation to its two parent forms, or to one of
them, it sometimes does not revert perfectly, but assumes a
somewhat new character, — of which fact, instances have been
given, and Carriere gives^^® another in the cherry.
Many cases of bud- variation, however, cannot be attributed
to reversion, but to so-called spontaneous variability, as is
so common with cultivated plants raised from seed. As a
single variety of the Chrysanthemum has produced by buds
six other varieties, and as one variety of the gooseberry has
borne at the same time four distinct kinds of fruit, it is
scarcely possible to believe that all these variations are due to
reversion. We can hardly believe, as remarked in a previous
chapter, that all the many peaches which have yielded
nectarine-buds are of crossed parentage. Lastly, in such
cases as that of the moss-rose, with its peculiar calyx, and of
the rose which bears opposite leaves, in that of the Imanto-
phyllum, &c., there is no known natural species or variety
It may be worth while to call
attention to the several means by
which flowers and fruit become
striped or mottled. Firstly, by the
direct action of the pollen of another
variety or species, as in the cases
given of oranges and maize. Secondly,
i] crosses of the first generation,
uhen the colours of the two parents
do not readily unite, as with Mirabilis
and Dianthus. Thirdly, in crossed
plants of a subsequent generation
by reversion, through either bud or
seminal generation. Fourthly, by re-
version to a character not originally
gained by a cross, but which had
Jong been lost, as with white-flowered
vai’ieties, which we shall hereafter see
often become striped with some other
colour. Lastly, there are cases, as
when peaches are produced with a
half or quarter of the fruit like a
nectarine, in which the change is
apparently due to mere variation,
through either bud or seminal
generation.
155 ‘'Production des Varidt^s, p,
37.
440
CONCLUSION AND SUMMARY
Chap. XI.
from which the characters in question could have been derived
by a cross. We must attribute all such cases to the appear-
ance of absolutely new characters in the buds. The varieties
which have thus arisen cannot be distinguished b}'- any
external character from seedlings ; this is notoriously the case
with the varieties of the Kose, Azalea, and many other plants,
It deserves notice that all the plants which have yielded
bud-variations have likewise varied greatly by seed.
The plants which have varied by buds belong to so many
orders that we may infer that almost every plant would be
liable to variation, if placed under the proper exciting
conditions. These conditions, as far as we can judge, mainly
depend on long-continued and high cultivation; for almost
all the plants in the foregoing list are perennials, and have
been largely propagated in many soils, under different climates,
by cuttings, offsets, bulbs, tubers, and especially by budding
or grafting. The instances of annuals varying by buds, or
producing on the same plant differently coloured flowers,
are comparatively rare : Hopkirk has seen this with Con-
volvulus tricolor ; and it is not uncommon with the Balsam
and annual Delphinium. According to Sir E. Schomburgk,
plants from the warmer temperate regions, when cultivated
under the hot climate of St. Domingo, are eminently liable to
bud-variation. I am informed by Mr. Sedgwick that moss-
roses which have often been taken to Calcutta always there
lose their mossiness ; but change of climate is by no means a
necessary contingent, as we see with the gooseberry, currant,
and in many other cases. Plants living under their natural
conditions are very rarely subject to bud-variation. Varie-
gated leaves have, however, been observed under such circum-
stances ; and I have given an instance of variation by buds on
an ash-tree planted in ornamental grounds, but it is doubtful
whether such a tree can be considered as living under strictly
natural conditions. Gartner has seen white and dark red
flowers produced from the same root of the wild Achillea
millefolium ; and Prof. Caspary has seen a completely wild
Viola lutea bearing flowers of two different colours andsizes.^^’
156 < Flora Anomala,’ p. 164. GeselL zu Konigsbevg,’ Band vi., Feb
‘Sehviften der physisch-okon. 3, 1865, s. 4.
Chap. XI.
OF THE CHAPTER.
441
As wild plants are so rarely liable to bud- variation, whilst
highly cultivated plants long propagated by artificial means
have yielded many varieties by this form of reproduction, wcj
are led through a series such as the following, — namely, all
the eyes in the same tuber of the potato varying in the same
manner, — all the fruit on a purple plum-tree suddenly
becoming yellow, — all the fruit on a double-flowered almond
suddenly becoming peach like, — all the buds on grafted trees
being in a very slight degree affected by the stock on which
they have been worked, — all the flowers on a transplanted
heartsease changing for a time in colour, size, and shape, — we
are led by such a series to look at every case of bud- variation
as the direct result of the conditions of life to which the
plant has been exposed. On the other hand, plants ot the
same variety may be cultivated in two adjoining beds, appa-
rently under exactly the same conditions, and those in the one
bed, as Carriere insists,^^® will produce man}^ bud-variations,
and those in the other not a single one. Again, if we look to
such cases as that of a peach-tree which, after having been cul-
tivated by tens of thousands during many years in many
countries, and after having annually produced millions of
buds, all of which have apparently been exposed to precisely
the same conditions, yet at last suddenly produces a single
bud with its whole character greatly transformed, we are
driven to the conclusion that the transformation stands in
no direct relation to the conditions of life.
We have seen that varieties produced from seeds and from
buds resemble each other so closely in general appearance
that they cannot be distinguished. Just as certain species
and groups of species, when propagated by seed, are more
variable than other species or genera, so it is in the case of
certain bud- varieties. Thus, the Queen of England Chry-
santhemum has produced by this latter process no less than
six, and Eollisson’s Unique Pelargonium four distinct
varieties ; moss-roses have also produced several other moss-
roses. The Eosaceee have varied by buds more than any
other group of plants ; but this may be in large part due
to sc many members having been long cultivated; but
158 ‘Production des Varietes,’ pp. 58, 70.
442
CONCLUSION AND SUMMARY
Chap. XI,
within this same group, the peach has often varied by buds,
whilst the apple and pear, both grafted trees extensively
cultivated, have afforded, as far as I can ascertain, extremely
few instances of bud- variation.
The law of analogous variation holds good with varieties
produced by buds, as with those produced from seed : more
than one kind of rose has sported into a moss-rose; more
than one kind of camellia has assumed an hexagonal form ; and
at least seven or eight varieties of the peach have produced
nectarines.
The laws of inheritance seem to be nearly the same with
seminal and bud -varieties. We know how commonly reversion
comes into play with both, and it may affect the whole, or
only segments of a leaf, flower, or fruit. When the tendency
to reversion affects many buds on the same tree, it becomes
covered with different kinds of leaves, flowers, or fruit ; but
there is reason to believe that such fluctuating varieties have
generally arisen from seed. It is well known that, out of a
number of seedling varieties, some transmit their character
much more trul}^ by seed than others ; so with bud- varieties,
some retain their character by successive buds more truly than
others ; of which instances have been given with two kinds
of variegated Euonymus and with certain kinds of tulips and
pelargoniums. Notwithstanding the sudden production of
bud-varieties, the characters thus acquired are sometimes
capable of transmission by seminal reproduction : Mr. Rivers
has found that moss-roses generally reproduce themselves by
seed ; and the mossy character has been transferred by crossing
from one species of rose to another. I'he Boston nectarine,
which appeared as a bud-variation, produced by seed a closely
allied nectarine. On the other hand, seedlings from some
bud-variations have proved variable to an extreme degree.
We have also heard, on the authority of Mr. Salter, that
seeds taken from a bi anch with leaves variegated through
bud- variation, transmit this character very feebly ; whilst
many plants, which were variegated as seedlings, transmit
variegation to a large proportion of their progeny.
Although I have been able to collect a good many cases of
Carrifere, ‘ Production des Varietes,’ p. 39.
Chap. XL
OF THE CHAPTEK.
443
bud-variation, as shown in the previous lists, and might pro-
bably, by searching foreign horticultural works, have col-
lected very many more cases, yet their total number is as
nothing in comparison with that of seminal varieties. With
seedlings raised from the more variable cultivated plants, the
variations are almost infinitely numerous, but their difierences
are generally slight : only at long intervals of time a strongly
marked modification appears. On the other hand, it is a
singular and inexplicable fact that, when plants vary by buds,
the variations, though they occur with comparative rarity, are
often, or even generally, strongly pronounced. It struck me that
this might perhaps be a delusion, and that slight changes often
occurred in buds, but were overlooked or not recorded from
being of no value. Accordingly, I applied to two great
authorities on this subject, namely, to Mr. Kivers with
respect to fruit-trees, and to Mr. Salter with respect to flowers.
Mr. Eivers is doubtful, but does not remember having noticed
very slight variations in fruit-buds. Mr. Salter informs me
that with flowers such do occur, but, if propagated, they
generally lose their new character in the following year ; yet
he concurs with me that bud-variations usually at once assume
a decided and permanent character. We can hardly doubt
that this is the rule, when we reflect on such cases as that
of the peach, which has been so carefully observed, and of
which such trifling seminal varieties have been propagated, yet
this tree has repeatedly produced by bud- variation nectarines,
and only twice (as far as I can learn) any other variety,
namely, the Early and Late Grosse Mignonne peaches ; and
these differ from the parent-tree in hardly any character
except the period of maturity.
To my surprise, I hear from Mr. Salter that he brings the
principle of selection to bear on variegated plants propagated
by buds, and has thus greatly improved and fixed several
varieties. He informs me that at first a branch often pro-
duces variegated leaves on one side alone, and that the leaves
are marked only with an irregular edging or with a few lines
of white and yellow. To improve and fix such varieties, he
finds it necessary to encourage the buds at the bases of the
most distinctly marked leaves, and to propagate from them
444:
SUMMARY OF THE CHAPTER.
Chap. Xl.
alone. By following with perseverance this })lan dni-ing
three or four successive seasons, a distinct and fixed variety
can generally he secured.
Finally, the facts given in this chapter prove in how close
and remarkable a manner the germ of a fertilised seed and
the small cellular mass forming a bud, resemble each other in
all their functions — in their power of inheritance with occa-
sional reversion, — and in their capacity for variation of the
same general nature, in obedience to the same laws. 4'his re-
semblance, or rather identity of character, is shown in the
most striking manner by the fact that the cellular tissue
of one species or variety, when budded or grafted on another,
may give rise to a bud having an intermediate character.
We have seen that variability does not depend on sexual
generation, though much more frequently its concomitant than
of bud reproduction. We have seen that bud-variability
is not solely dependent on reversion or atavism to long-lost
characters, or to those formerly acquired from a cross, but
appears often to be spontaneous. But when we ask ourselves
what is the cause of any particular bud- variation, we are lost
in doubt, being driven in some cases to look to the direct
action of the external conditions of life as sufficient, and in
other cases to feel a profound conviction that these have played
a quite subordinate part, of not more importance than the
nature of the spark which ignites a mass of combustible
matter.
Chap. XII.
INHERITANCE.
445
CHAPTER XII.
INHERITANCE. --
\^ONr)EEFXJL NATURE OP INHERITANCE — PEDIGREES OP OUR DOMESTICATED
ANIMALS — INHERITANCE NOT DUE TO CHANCE — TRIPLING CHARACTERS
INHERITED — DISEASES INHERITED — PECULIARITIES IN THE EYE INHERITED
— DISEASES IN THE HORSE — LONGEVITY AND VIGOUR — ASYMMETRICAL
DEVIATIONS OF STRUCTURE — I’OLYDACTYLISM AND REGROW'TH OF SUPER-
NUMERARY DIGITS AFTER AMPUTATION — CASES OP SEVERAL CHILDREN
SIMILARLY AFFECTED FROM NON - AFFECTED PARENTS WEAK AND
FLUCTUATING INHEKITANCE : IN WEEPING TREES, IN DWARFNESS, COLOUR
OP FRUIT AND FLOWERS-- COLOUR OF HORSES NON-INHERIT4NCE IN
CERTAIN CASES -^INHERITANCE OP STRUCTURE AND HABITS OVERBORNE
BY HOSTILE CONDITIONS OP LIFE, BY INCESSANTLY RECURRING VARIA-
BILITY, and by reversion — CONCLUSION.
The subject of inlieritance is an immense one, and has been
treated by many authors. One Avork alone, ‘ He I’Heredite
Katurelle,’ by Hr. Prosper Lucas, runs to the length of 1562
pages. We must confine ourselves to certain points which have
an important bearing on the general subject of variation, both
with domestic and natural productions. It is obvious that a
variation which is not inherited throws no light on the deri-
vation of species, nor is of any service to man, except in the
case of perennial plants, which can be propagated by buds.
If animals and plants had never been domesticated, and
wild ones alone had been observed, we should probably never
have heard the saying,* that “like begets like.” The propo
sition would have been as self-evident as that all the buds on
the same tree are alike, though neither proposition is strictly
true. For, as has often been remarked, probably no two
individuals are identically the same. All wild animals re-
cognise each other, which shows that there is some difference
between them ; and when the eye is Avell practised, the shep-
herd knows each sheep, and man can distinguish a fellow-
man out of millions on millions of other men. Some authors
have gone so far as to maintain that the production of slight
differences is as much a necessary function of the powers of
440
INHERITANCE.
Cjiap. XII
generation, as the production of offspring like tlieii' parents.
This view, as we shall see in a future chapter, is not theoreti-
cally probable, though practically it holds good. The saying
that “ like begets like ” has, in fact, arisen from the perfect
confidence felt by breeders, that a superior or inferior animal
will generally reproduce its kind ; but this very superiority
or inferiority shows that the individual in question has
departed slightly from its type.
The whole subject of inheritance is wonderful. When a
new character arises, whatever its nature may be, it generally
tends to be inherited, at least in a temporary and sometimes
in a most persistent manner. What can be more wonderful
than that I'Ome trifling peculiarity, not primordially attached
to the species, should be transmitted through the male or
female sexual cells, which are so minute as not to be visible
to the naked eye, and afterwards through the incessant
changes of a long course of development, undergone either in
the womb or in the egg, and ultimately appear in the offspring
when mature, or even when quite old, as in the case of certain
diseases ? Or again, what can be more wonderful than the
well-ascertained fact that the minute ovule of a good milking
cow will produce a male, from whom a cell, in union with an
ovule, will produce a female, and she, when mature, will have
large mammary glands, yielding an abundant supply of milk,
and even milk of a particular quality? Nevertheless, the
real subject of surprise is, as Sir H. Holland has well remarked,^
not that a character should be inherited, but that any should
ever fail to be inherited. In a future chapter, devoted to an
hypothesis which I have termed pangenesis, an attempt will
be made to show the means by which characters of all kinds
are transmitted from generation to generation.
Some writers,^ who have not attended to natural history,
have attempted to show that the force of inheritance has been
much exaggerated. The breeders of animals would smile at
such simplicity; and if they condescended to make any
* ‘ Medical Notes and Reflections,’ tistics. See also Mr. Bowen, Professor
3rd edit., 1855, p. 267. of Moral Philosophy, in ‘ Proc.
2 Mr. Buckle, in his ‘ History of American Acad, of Sciences,’ vol. v.
Civilisation,’ expresses doubts on the p. 102.
subject, owing to the want of sta-
Chap. XII.
INHERITANCE.
447
answer, might ask what would be the chance of winning a
prize if two inferior animals were paired together? They
might ask whether the half- wild Arabs were led by theoreti-
cal notions to keep pedigrees of their horses ? Why have
pedigrees been scrupulously kept and published of the Short-
horn cattle, and more recently of the Hereford breed ? Is it
ill illusion that these recently improved animals safely ^ans-
mit their excellent qualities even when crossed with other
breeds? have the Shorthorns, without good reason, been
purchased at immense prices and exported to almost every
quarter of the globe, a thousand guineas having been given
for a bull? With greyhounds pedigrees have likewise been
kept, and the names of such dogs, as Snowball, Major, &c.,
are as well known to coursers as those of Eclipse and Herod
on the turf. Even with the Gamecodk, pedigrees of famous
strains were formerly kept, and extended back for a century.
With pigs, the Yorkshire and Cumberland breeders “ preserve
and print pedigrees and to show how such highly-bred
animals are valued, I may mention that Mr. Brown, who
won all the first prizes for small breeds at Birmingham in
1850, sold a young sow and boar of his breed to Lord Hucie
for 43 guineas ; the sow alone was afterwards sold to the
Kev. F. Thursby for 65 guineas; who writes, “She paid me
very well, having sold her produce for 300Z., and having now
four breeding sows from her.” ^ Hard cash paid down, over
and over again, is an excellent test of inherited superiority.
In fact, the whole art of breeding, from which such great
results have been attained during the present century, depends
on the inheritance of each small detail of structure. But
inheritance is not certain ; for if it were, the breeder’s art^
would be reduced to a certainty, and there would be little
scope left for that wonderful skill and perseverance shown by
the men vdio have left an enduring monument of their success
in the present state of our domesticated animals.
It is hardly possible, within a moderate compass, to impress
For greyhounds, see Low’s ‘Do- Mr. Sidney’s edit, of ‘ Youatt, on the
intstic Animals of the British Islands,’ Big,’ 1860, pp. 11, 22.
1845, p. 721. For game-fowls, see ^ ‘The Stud Farm,’ by Cecil, p.
‘The Poultry Book,’ by Mr. Teget- 39.
raeier, 1866, p. 123. For pigs, see
448
INHERITANCE.
Chai>. XII.
on the mind of those who have not attended to the subject,
the full conviction of the force of inheritance which is slowly
acquired by rearing animals, by studying the many treatises
which have been published on the various domestic animals,
and by conversing with breeders. I will select a few facts
of the kind, which, as far as I can judge, have most influenced
my own mind. With man and the domestic animals, certain
peculiarities have appeared in an individual, at rare intervals,
or only once or twice in the history of the world, but have
reappeared in several of the children and grandchildren.
Thns Lambert, “the porcupine-man,” whose skin was thickly
covered with warty projections, which were periodically
moulted, had all his six children and two grandsons similarly
affected.^ The face and body being covered with long hair,
accompanied by deficient teeth (to which I shall hereafter
refer), occurred in three successive generations in a Siamese
family ; but this case is not unique, as a woman ® with a
completely hairy face who was exhibited in London in 1663,
and another instance has recently occurred. Colonel Hall am
has described a race of two-legged pigs, “the hinder extremi-
ties being entirely wanting and this deficiency was trans-
mitted through three generations. In fact, all races
presenting any remarkable peculiarity, such as solid-hoofed-
swine, Mauchamp sheep, niata cattle, &c., are instances of the
lon2:-continued inheritance of rare deviations of structure.
When we reflect that certain extraordinary ])eculiarities
have thus appeared in a single individual out of many
millions, all exposed in the same country to the same general
conditions of life, and, again, that the same extraordinary
peculiarity has sometimes appeared in individuals living
under widely different conditions of life, we are driven to
conclude that such peculiarities are not directly due to the
action of the surrounding conditions, but to unknown laws
acting on the organisation or constitution of the individual ;
® ‘ Philosophical Transactions,’ 1755, the males alone,
p. 23. 1 have seen only second-hand ® Barbara Van Beck, ligured, as I
accounts of the two grandsons. Mr. am informed by the Rev. W. D. Fox,
Sedgwick, in a paper to which I shall in Woodburn’s ‘Gallery of Rare
hereafter often refer, states ih&i four Portraits,’ 1816, vol. ii.
generations were affected, and in each ^ ‘Proc. Zoolog. Soc.,’ 1833^ p. 16,
ClIAl'. XI 1.
INHERITANCE.
44‘J
— that their production stands in hardly closer relation to the
conditions of life than does life itself. If this be so, and the
occurrence of the same unusual character in the child and
parent cannot be attributed to both having been exposed to
the same unusual conditions, then the following problem is
worth consideration, as showing that the result cannot be
due. as some authors have supposed, to mere coincidence, but
must be consequent on the members of the same family
inheriting something in common in their constitution. Let
it be assumed that, in a large population, a particular affec-
tion occurs on an average in one out of a million, so that the
a priori chance that an individual taken at random will be
so affected is only one in a million. Let the population
consist of sixty millions, composed, we will assume, of ten
million families, each containing six members. On these
data, Professor Stokes has calculated for me that the odds
will be no less than 8333 millions to 1 that in the ten million
families there will not be even a single family in which one
parent and two children will be alfected by the peculiarity
in question. But numerous instances could be given, in
wliich several children have been affected by the same rare
peculiarity with one of their parents ; and in this case, more
especially if the grandchildren be included in the calculation,
the odds against mere coincidence become something prodi-
gious, almost beyond enumeration.
In some respects the evidence of inheritance is more
striking when we consider the reappearance of trifling pecu-
liarities. Dr. Hodgkin formerly told me of an English family
in which, for many generations, some members had a single
lock differently coloured from the rest of the hair. I knew
an Irish gentleman, who, on the right side of his head, had a
small white lock in the midst of his dark hair ; he assured
me that his grandmother had a similar lock, on the same side,
and his mother on the opposite side. But it is superfluous to
give instances ; every shade of expression, which may often
be seen alike in parents and children, tells the same story.
On what a curious combination of corporeal structure, mental
character, and training, handwriting depends ! yet every one
must have noted the occasional close similarity of the hand
30
450
INHERITANCE.
Chap. XII
writing in father and son, altliough the father had not tanghi
his son. A great collector of autographs assured nio that in hia
collection there were several signatures of father and son hardly
distinguishable except by their dates. Hofacker, in Germany,
remarks on the inheritance of handwriting ; and it has even
been asserted that English boys when taught to write in
Eiance naturally cling to their English manner of writing;
but for so extraordinary a statement more evidence is requi-
site.^ Gait, gestures, voice, and general bearing are all
inherited, as the illustrious Hunter and Sir A. Carlisle have
insisted.® My father communicated to mo some striking
instances, in one of which a man died during the early infancy
of his son, and my father, who did not see this son until
grown up and out of health, declared that it seemed to him
as if his old friend had risen from the grave, with all his
highly peculiar habits and manners. Peculiar manners pass
into tricks, and several instances could be given of their
inheritance ; as in the case, often quoted, of the father vduj
generally slept on his back, with his right leg crossed over
the left, and whose daughter, whilst an infant in the cradle,
followed exactly the same habit, though an attempt was
made to cure her.^® I will give one instance which has
fallen under my ov/n observation, and which is curious from
being a trick associated with a peculiar state of mind, namely,
pleasureable emotion. A boy had the singular habit, when
pleased, of rapidl}^ moving his fingers parallel to each other,
and, when much excited, of raising both hands, with the
fingers still moving, to the sides of his face on a level with
the eyes ; when this boy was almost an old man, he could still
hardly resist this trick when much pleased, but from its
absurdity concealed it. He had eight children. Of these, a
girl, when pleased, at the age of four and a half years, moved
her fingers in exactly the same way, and Avhat is still odder,
when much excited, she raised both her hands, with her
* Hofiicker, ‘ Ueber die Eigenschaf- Carlisle, ‘Phil. Transact.,’ 1814, p,
len,’ &c., 1828, s. 34. With respect 94.
to France, Report by Pariset in Girou de Buzareignues, ‘ De la
‘Comptes Rendus,’ 1847, p. 592. Generation,’ p. 282. I have given an
® Hunter, as quoted in Harlan’s analogous case in my book on ‘ The
‘ Med. Researches,’ p. 530. Sir A. Expression of the Emotions.’
ClIAP. XII.
INHEKITANCE.
451
fingers still moving, to the sides of her face, in exactly the
same manner as her father had done, and sometimes even
still continued to do so when alone, I never heard of any one,
excepting this one man and liis little daughter, wiio had this
strange habit ; and certainly imitation was in this instance
out of the question.
Some writers have doubted whether those complex mental
attributes, on which genius and talent depend, are inherited,
even when both parents are thus endowed. But he who will
study Mr. Galton’s able work on ‘ Hereditary Genius ’ will have
his doubts allayed.
Unfortunately^ it matters not, as far as inheritance is con-
cerned, how injurious a quality or structure may be if com-
patible with life. No one can read the many treatises on
hereditary disease and doubt this. The ancients were strongly
of this opinion, or, as Eanchin expresses it, Omnes Grcuci, Arabes,
et Laiini in eo consentiunt. A long catalogue could be given of
all sorts of inherited malformations and of predisposition to
various diseases. With gout, fifty per cent, of the cases
observed in hospital practice are, according to Dr. Garrod,
inherited, and a greater percentage in private practice. Every-
one knows how often insanity runs in families, and some of
the cases given by Mr. Sedgwick are awful, — as of a surgeon,
whose brother, father, and four paternal uncles were all
insane, the latter dying by suicide ; of a Jew, whose father,
mother, and six brothers and sisters were all mad ; and in
some other cases several members of the same family, during
three or four successive generations, have committed suicide.
Striking instances have been recorded of epilepsy, consump-
The works which I have read
and found most useful are Dr. Prosper
Lucas’s great work, ‘Traile de
I’Heredite Xaturelle,’ 1847; Mr. W.
Sedgwick, in ‘ British and Foreign
Medico-Chirurg. Review,’ April and
July, 1861, and April and July, i860 :
Dr. Garrod on Gout is quoted in these
articles. Sir Henry Holland, ‘Medical
Notec and Reflections,' 8rd edit. 1855.
Piorry, ‘ De I’Heredite dans lea
Maladies,’ 1840. Adams, ‘A Philo-
sophical Treatise on Hereditary Pe-
culiarities,’ 2nd edit., 1815. Essay
on ‘Hereditary Diseases,’ by Dr. J.
Steinan, 1843. See Paget, in ‘Medical
Times,’ 1857, p. 192, on the Inheri-
tance of Cancer ; Dr. Gould, in
‘ Proc. of American Acad, of Sciences,’
Nov. 8, 1853, gives a curious case ol
hereditary bleeding in four genera-
tions. Harlan, ‘ Medical Researches,
p. 593.
452
INHERITANCE.
Chap. XU
tidn, asthma, stone in the bladder, cancer, profuse l)lecding
from the slightest injuries, of the mother not giving milk, and
of ball parturition being inherited. In this latter respect I
ma}?- mention an odd case given by a good observer,^''^ in
which the fault lay in the offspring, and not in the mother :
ill a part of Yorkshire the farmers continued to select cattle
with large hind-quarters, until they made a strain called
“ Uutch-buttocked,” and “ the monstrous size of the buttocks
of the calf was frequently fatal to the cow, and numbers of
cows were annually lost in calving.”
Instead of giving numerous details on various inherited malform-
ations and diseases, I will confine myself to one organ, that which is
the most complex, delicate, and probably best-known in the human
frame, namely, the eye, with its accessory parts.^^ To begin with the
latter : I have received an account of a family in which one parent
and the children are affected by drooping eyelids, in so peculiar a
manner, that they cannot see without throwing their heads back-
wards. Mr. Wade, of Wakefield, has given me an analogous case of
a man who had not his eyelids thus affected at birth, nor owed
their state, as far as was known, to inheritance, but they began to
droop whilst he was an infant after suffering from fits, and he has
transmitted the affection to two out of his three children, as , was
evident in the photographs of the whole family sent to me together
with this account. Sir A. Carlisle specifies a pendulous fold to
the eyelids, as inherited. “ In a family,” says Sir H. Holland,^''’
where the father had a singular elongation of the upper eyelid,
seven or eight children w^ere born with the same deformity ; two or
three other children having it not.” Many persons, as I hear from
Sir J. Paget, have two or three hairs in their eyebrows much longer
than the others ; and even so trifling a peculiarity as this certainly
runs in families.
With respect to the eye itself, the highest authority in England,
Mr. Bowman, has been so kind as to give me the following remarks
on certain inherited imperfections. First, hypermetroxjia, or
morbidly long sight : in this affection, the organ, instead of being
spherical, is too flat from front to back, and is often altogether too
small, so that the retina is brought too forward for the focus of the
humours ; consequently a convex glass is required for clear vision
Marsnall, quoted by Youatt in
liis work on Cattle, p. 284.
Almost any other organ might
have been selected. For instance,
Mr, J. Tomes, ‘System of Dental
Surgery,’ 2nd edit., 1873, p. 114,
gives many instances with teeth, and
others have been communicated to
me.
‘Philosoph. Transact.,’ 1814, j».
94.
‘ Medical Notes and Reflections”,
3rd edit,, p, 33.
Ohap. XII.
INHERIT AXCE.
>453
of near objects, and frequently even of distant ones. This state
occuis congenitally, or at a very early age, often in several children
of the same family, where one of the parents has presented it.^*^
Secondly, myopia, or short-sight, in which the eye is egg-shaped and
too long from front to back ; the retina in this case lies behind the
focus, and is therefore fitted to see distinctly only very near objects.
This condition is not commonly congenital, but comeson in youth,
the liability to it being well known to be transmissible from parent
to child. The change from the spherical to theovoidal shape seems
the immediate consequence of something like inflammation of the
coats, under which they yield, and there is ground for believing that
it may often originate in causes acting on the individual affected,^^
and may thenceforward become transmissible. When both parents
are myopic Mr. Bowman has observed the hereditary tendency in
this direction to be heightened, and some of the children to be
myopic at an earlier age or in a higher degree than their parents.
Thirdly, squinting is a familiar example of hereditary transmission :
it is frequently a result of such optical defects as have been above
mentioned; but the more primary and uncomplicated forms of it
are also sometimes in a marked degree transmitted in a family.
Fourthly, Cataract, or opacity of the crystalline lens, is commonly
observed in persons whose parents have been similarly affected, and
often at an earlier age in the children than in the parents. Occasion-
ally more than one child in a family is thus afflicted, one of whose
parents or other relations, presents the senile form of the complaint.
When cataract affects several members of a family in the same
generation, it is often seen to commence at about the same age in
each : e.g., in one family several infants or young persons may suffer
from it ; in another, several persons of middle age. Mr, Bowman
also informs me that he has occasionally seen, in several members of
the same family, various defects in either the right or left eye ; and
Mr. White Cooper has often seen peculiarities of vision confined to
one eye reappearing in the same eye in the offspring.^®
The following cases are taken from an able paper by Mr. W.
Fedgwick, and from Dr. Prosper Lucas.^® Amaurosis, either con-
genital or coming on late in life, and causing total blindness, is often
inherited; it has been observed in three successive generations.
Congenital absence of the iris has likewise been transmitted for
This affection, as I hear from
Mr, Bowman, has been ably described
and spoken of as hereditary by Dr.
bonders of Utrecht, whose work was
published in English by the Sydenham
Society in 1864.
M. Giraud-Teulbn has recently
collected abundant statistical evidence,
‘ ffevue des Cours Scientifiques,’ Sept.,
1870, p. 625, showing that short
sight is due to the habit of viewing
objects from a short distance, e'est
Ic tratail assidu, de pres.
** Quoted by Mr. Herbert Spencer,
‘ Principles of Biology,’ vol. i. p. 244,
19 i British and Eoreign Medico-
Chirurg. Review,’ April, 1861, pp,
482-6 ; ‘ L’Hered. Nat.,’ tom. i. pp
391-408.
454
INHERITANCE.
Chap. XII
three generations, a cleft-iris for four generations, being limited in
this latter ease to the males of the family. Opacity of tlie cornea
and congenital smallness of the eyes have been inherited. Portal
records a curious case, in which a father and two sons were rendered
blind, whenever the head was bent downwards, apparently owing to
the crystalline lens, with its capsule, slipping tlirough an unusually
large pupil into the anterior chamber of the eye. Day-blindness, or im-
perfect vision under a bright light, is inherited, as is night-blindness,
or an incapacity to see except under a strong light : a case has been
recorded, by M. Cunier, of this latter defect having affected eighty-
five members of the same family during six generations. The
singular incapacity of distinguishing colours, which has been called
Daltonism, is notoriously hereditary, and has been traced through
five generations, in which it was confined to the female sex.
With respect to the colour of the iris : deficiency of colouring
matter is well known to be hereditary in albinoes. The iris of one
eye being of different colour from that of the other, and the iris
being spotted, are cases which have been inherited. Mr. Sedgwick
gives, in addition, on the authority of Dr. Osborne,^® the following
curious instance of strong inheritance : a family of sixteen sons and
five daughters all had eyes ‘‘ resembling in miniature the markings
on the back of a tortoiseshell cat.” The mother of this large family
had three sisters and a brother all similarly marked, and they
derived this peculiarity from their mother, who belonged to a
family notorious for transmitting it to their posterity.
Finally, Dr. Lucas emphatically remarks that there is not one
single faculty of the eye which is not subject to anomalies; and not
one which is not subjected to the principle of inheritance. Mr.
Bovvinan agrees with the general truth of this proposition ; ^hich of
course does not imply that all malformations are necessarily
inherited; this would not even follow if both parents were affected
by an anomaly which in most cases was transmissible.
Even if no single fact had been known with resjoect to the
inheritance of disease and malformations by man, the evidence
would have been ample in the case of the horse. And this
might have been expected, as horses breed much <piicker than
man, are matched with care, and are highly valued. 1 have
consulted many works, and the unanimity of the belief by
veterinaries of all nations in the transmission of various
morbid tendencies is surprising. Authors who have had wide
experience give in detail many singular cases, and assert that
contracted feet, with the numerous contingent evils, of ring-
bones, curbs, splints, spavin, founder and weakness of the front
Dr. O'borue, Pres, of Roy.'il this case in the ‘ Dublin Medical
College of Phys. in Ireland, published Journal,’ for 1835.
Chap. XIL
INHERITANCE.
455
legs, roaring or broken and thick wind, melanosis, specific
ophthalmia, and blindness (the great French veterin ary Huzard
going so far as to sa}^ that a blind race could soon be formed),
crib-biting, jibbing and ill- temper, are all plainly hereditary.
Yoiiatt sums up by saying “ there is scarcely a malady to
wdiich the horse is subject which is not hereditary and M.
Bernard adds that the doctrine “ that there is scarcely a
disease which does not run in the stock, is gaining new
advocates every day.” So it is in regard to cattle, with
consumption, good and bad teeth, fine skin, &c. &c. But
enough, and more than enough, has been said on disease.
Andrew Knight, from his own experience, asserts that disease
is hereditary with plants ; and this assertion is endorsed by
Lindley.22
Seeing how hereditary evil qualities are, it is fortunate
that good health, vigour, and longevity are equally inherited.
It was formerly a well-known practice, when annuities were
purchased to be received during the life-time of a nominee, to
search out a person belonging to a family of which many
members had lived to extreme old age. As to the inheritance
of vigour and endurance, the English race-horse ohers an ex-
cellent instance. Eclipse begot 334, and King Herod 497
winners. A “ cock-tail ” is a horse not purely bred, but with
only one-eighth, or one-sixteenth impure blood in his veins,
yet very few instances have ever occurred of such horses
having won a great race. They are sometimes as fleet for
short distances as thoroughbreds, but as Mr. Eobson, the
Tliese various statements are
taken from the following works and
papers : — Youatt on ‘ The Horse,’ pp.
of), 220. Lawrence, ‘ The Horse,’ p.
do. Karkeek, in an excellent paper
in ‘ Card. Chronicle,’ 1853, p. 92.
Mr. Burke, in ‘ .lournal of R. Agricul.
Soc. of England,’ vol. v. p. 511.
‘ Encyclt)]). of Rural Sports, p. 279,
Girou de Buzareignues, ‘ Philosoph.
Phys.,’ j). 215. See following papers
in ‘ The Veterinary Roberts, in vol.
ii. p, 14-4; M. Marrimpoey, vol. ii. p.
387 ; Mr. Karkeek, vol. iv. p. 5 ;
Youatt on Goitre in Dogs, vol. v. p.
483: Youatt in vol. vi. pp. 66, 348,
412 ; ]\I. Bernard, vol. xi. p. 539 ;
Dr. Samesreuther, on Cattle, in vol.
xii. p. 181; Percivall, in vol. xiii. p.
47. With respect to blindness in
horses, see also a whole row of
authorities in Dr. P. Lucas’s great
work, tom. i. ]>. 399. Mr. Baker in
‘The V'eteriuary,’ vol. xiii. p. 721,
gives a strong case of hereditary
imperfect vision and of jibbing.
Knighton ‘The Culture of the
Apple and Pear,’ p. 34. Liudley’s
‘ Horticulture,’ p. 180.
INHERITANCE.
ClIAI'. Xll
45()
great trainer, asserts, they are deficient in wind, and cannot
keep np the pace. Mr. Lawrence also reinarlcs, “ perhaps no
instance lias ever occurred of a three-part-bred horse saving
his ‘ distance ’ in running two miles with thoroughbred racers.”
It has been stated by Cecil, that when unknown horses, whose
parents were not celebrated, have unexpectedly won great
races, as in the case of Priam, they can always be proved to
be descended, on both sides, through many generations, from
first-rate ancestors. On tlio Continent, Baron Cameronn
challenges, in a German veterinary periodical, the opponents
of the English race-horse to name one good horse on the
Continent, which has not some English race-blood in his
veins.^^
With respect to the transmission of the many slight, but
infinitely diversified characters, by which the domestic races
of animals and plants are distinguished, nothing need be said ;
for the veiy existence of persistent races ^^I’oclaims the power
of inheritance.
A few special cases, however, deserve some consideration.
It might have been anticipated, that deviations from the law
of symmetry would not have been inherited. But Anderson''^^
states that a rabbit produced in a litter a young animal
having only one ear ; and from this animal a breed was
formed which steadily produced one-eared rabbits. He also
mentions a bitch with a single leg deficient, and she produced
several puppies with the same deficiency. From Hofacker’s
account, it appears that a one-horned stag was seen in 1781
in a forest in Germany, in 1788 two, and afterwards, from
3"ear to year, many were observed with only one horn on the
right side of the head. A cow lost a horn by suppuration,'-^*"
and she produced three calves which had on the same side of
the head, instead of a horn, a small bony lump attached
These statements are taken from
the following works in order: — Youatt
on • The Horse,’ p. 48; Mr. Darvill,
in ‘The Veterinary,’ vol. viii. p. 50.
With respect to Robson, see ‘The
Veterinary,’ vol. iii. p. 580; Mr.
Lawrence on ‘The Horse,’ 1829, p. 9;
= The Stud Farm,’ by Cecil, 1851
Baron Cameronn, quoted in ‘ The
Veterinary,’ vol. x. p. 500.
2-* ‘ Recreations in Agriculture and
Nat. Hist.,’ vol. i. p. 68.
‘ Ueber die Eigenschaften,’ &c.,
1828, s. 107.
Bronn’s ‘ Geschichte der Nalur,
Band ii. s. 132.
CllAP. Xli.
INHEKITANCE.
457
merely to the sldn ; hnt we here encroach on the snhject of
inherited mutilations. A man who is left-handed, and a
shell in which the spire turns in the wrong directions, are
departures from the normal asymmetrical condition, and they
are well-known to he inherited.
Polydactylif^m . — Supernumerary fingers and toes are eminently
liable, as various authors have insisted, to be inherited. Poly-
dactylism graduates by multifarious steps from a mere cutaneous
appendage, not including any bone, to a double hand. But an ad-
ditional digit, suxjported on a metacarpal bone, and furnished with
all the proper muscles, nerves, and vessels, is sometimes so perfect,
that it escapes detection, unless the fingers are actually counted.
Occasionally there are several supernumerary digits; but usually
only one, making the total number six. This one may be attached
to the inner oi' outer margin of the hand, representing either a
thumb or little finger, the latter being the more frequent. Gene-
rally, through the law of correlation, both hands and both feet are
similarly affected. Dr. Burt Wilder has tabulated^* a large number
of cases, and finds that supernumerary digits are more common on
the hands than on the feet, and that men are alfected often er than
women. Both these facts can be ex^Dlained on two principles which
seem generally to hold good ; firstly, that of two parts, the more
specialised one is the more variable, and the arm is more highly
specialised than the leg; and secondly that male animals are more
variable than females.
The presence of a greater number of digits than five is a great
anomaly, for this number is not normally exceeded by any existing
mammal, bird, or reptile. Nevertheless, supernumerary digits are
strongly inherited ; they have been transmitted through five genera-
tions ; and in some cases, after disappearing for one, two, or even
three generations, have reappeared through reversion. These facts
are rendered, as Professor Huxley has observed, more remarkable
from its being known in most cases that the affected person has not
married one similarly affected. In such cases the child of the fifth
generation would have only l-32nd part of the blood of his first
scdigitated ancestor. Other cases are rendered remarkable by the
affection gathering force, as Dr. Struthers has shown, in each
generation, though in each the affected person married one not
affected ; moreover, such additional digits are often amputated soon
after birth, and can seldom have Deen strengthened by use. Dr.
V^rolik has discussed this point
at full length in a work published
in Dutch, t'roin which Sir J, Paget
Has kindly translated for me passages.
See, also, Isidore Geoffrey St. Hilaire’s
Glist. des Anomalies,’ 1832 tom. i
p. 684.
‘ Massacliusetts Medical Society,’
voi. ii. No. 3 ; and ‘ Proc. Boston
Soc. of Nat. Hist.,’ vol. xiv.. 1871, p,
154.
458
INHERITANCE.
CiiAr. X IL
Strutliers gives the following instance: in the first generation an
Htlditional digit a])pcared on one liand; in the second, on botli
hands; in the third, tliree brothers had both hands, and one of tlio
brothers a foot affected; and in the fonrtli generation all four limbs
were affected. Yet we must not over-estimate the force of inherit-
ance. Dr. Struthers asserts that cases of non-inheritaiice and of tlio
first ai^pearance of additional digits in unaffected families are much
more frequent than cases of inheritance. Many other deviations of
structure, of a nature almost as anomalous as supernumerary digits,
such as deficient phalanges,'^^ thickened joints, crooked fingers, &c.,
are, in like manner, strongly inherited, and are equally subject to
intermission, togetlier with reversion, though in such cases there
is no i-v-ason to suppose that both parents had been similarly
affected.^"
Additional digits have been observed in negroes as well as in
other races of man, and in several of the lower animals, and have
been inherited. Six toes have been described on the hind feet of the
newt (Sa/umandiu cridata), and are said to have occurred with the
frog. It deserves notice, that the six-toed newt, though adult,
preserved some of its larval characters; for part of the hyoidal
apparatus, which is properly absorbed during the act of metamor-
phosis, was retained. It is also remarkable that in the case of man
various structures in an embryonic or arrested state of development,
such as a cleft-palate, bifid uterus, Ac., are often accompanied by
]'>olydactylism.'^‘ Six toes on the liinder feet are known to have
been iuherited for three generations of cats. In several breeds of
the fowl the liinder toe is double, and is generally transmitted
truly, as is well shown when Dorkings are crossed with common
Dr J. W. Ogle gives a case of
the inheritance of deficient phalanges
during four generations. He adds
references to various recent papers on
inheritance, ‘ Brit, and For. Med.-
Chirurg. lieview,’ Ap. 1872.
For these several statements, see
Dr. Struthers, ‘ Edinburgh New Phil.
Journal,’ July, 18Gd, especially on
intermissions in the line of descent.
Prof. Huxley, ‘ Lectures on our Know-
ledge of Organic Nature,’ 1863, ]).
97. With )es|)ect to inheritance, see
Dr. Prosper Lucas, ‘ L’Heredite Nat.,’
tom. i. p. 325. Isid. Geotlroy, ‘ Amun.,’
tom. i. p. 701. Sir A. Carlisle, in
‘Phil. Transact:,’ 1814, p. 94. A.
Walker, on ‘ lutermai-riage,’ 1838,
p. 140, gives a case of five genera-
tions ; a.s does Mr. Sedgwick, in ‘ Brit,
and Foreign Medico-Chirurg. Review,’
April, 1863, p. 462. On the inheri-
tance of otlier anomalies in the ex-
tremities, see Dr. H. Dobell, in vol.
xlvi. of ‘i\ledico-Chirurg.Transactions,’
1863; also Mr. Sedgwick, in op. cit.,
April, 1863, p. 460. With respect tc
additional digits in the negro, see
Prichard, ‘ Physical History of Man-
kind.’ Dr. Dielfenbach (‘Jour. Royal
Geograph. Soc.,’ 1841, p. 208) says
this anomaly is not uncommon witli
the Polynesians of the Chatham
Islands; and I have heard of several
cases with Hindus ami Arabs.
hleckel and Isid G. St. Hilaire
insist on this fact. See, also iM. A.
Roujou, ‘ Sur quelques Analogies du
Type Humain,’ j). 61 ; published, 1
believe, in the ‘ Journal of the Authro-
polog. Soc. of Paris,’ Jan. 1872.
Chap. XII.
INHERITANCE.
45D
four-toed breeds.^^ With animals which have properly less than
five digits, the number is sometimes increased to five, especially on
the front legs, though rarely carried beyond that number; but this
is due to the development of a digit already existing in a more or
less rudimentary state. Thus, the dog has properly four toes behind,
but in the larger breeds a fifth toe is commonly, though not per-
fectly, developed. Horses, which properly have one toe alone fully
developed with rudiments of the others, have been described with
each foot bearing two or three small separate hoofs : analogous facts
liave been noticed with cows, sheep, goats, and pigs.^^
There is a famous case described by Mr. White of a child, three
years old, with a thumb double from the first joint. He removed
the' lesser thumb, which was furnished with a nail ; but to his
astonishment it grew again and reproduced a nail. The child was
then taken to an eminent London surgeon, and the newly-grown
thumb was removed by its socket-joint, but again it grew and re-
produced a nail. Hr. Struthers mentions a case of the partial
re-growth of an additional thumb, amputated when a child was
three months old ; and the’ late Dr. Falconer communicated to me
an analogous instance. In the last edition of this work I also gave
a case of the regrowth of a supernumerary little-finger after ampu-
tation; but having been informed by Dr. Bachmaier that several
eminent surgeons expressed, at a meeting of the Anthropological
Society of Munich, great doubt about my statements, I have made
more particular incpiiries. The full information thus gained, to-
gether with a tracing of the hand in its present state, has been laid
before Sir J. Paget, and he ha.s come to the conclusion that the de-
gree of regrowth in this case is not greater than sometimes occurs
with normal bones, especially with the humerus, when amputated
at an early age. He further does not feel fully satisfied about the
facts recorded by Mr. White. This being so, it is necessary for me
to withdraw the view which I formerly advanced, with much hesi-
tation, chiefly on the ground of the supposed regrowth of additional
digits, namely, that their occasional development in man is a case
of reversion to a lowly organised progenitor pro /ided with more
than five digits.
I may here allude to a class of facts closely allied to, but
somewhat different from, ordinary cases of inheritance. Sir
H. llollanAP^ states that brothers and sisters of the same
32 ‘ The Poultry Chronicle,’ 1854,
p. 559.
33 The statonieuts in this jjaragraph
are taken iroiii Isidore- Geoliroy St.
Hilaire, ‘Hist, des Anomalies,’ tom. i.
pp. G88-d9d. Mr. Goodman giv^es,
‘ Phil. Soc. of Cambridge,’ Nov^ 25,
1872, the case of a cow with throe
well developed toes on each hind limb,
besides the ordinary rudiments •, and
her calf by an ordinary bull had , extra
digits. ThiS calf also bore two calves
having extra digits.
3'* ‘ Medical Notes and Reflections,’
] 839, pp. 24, .34. See, also, Dr. P
Lucas, ‘ L’Hered, Nat.,’ tom. ii. p. 331
f
460
INHERITANCE.
Chap. XII.
family are froqiiently affected, often at about the same age,
by the same peculiar disease, not known to have previously
occuri’ed in the family. Ho specifies the occurrence of diabetes
in three brothers under ten years old ; he also remarks that
childreu of the same family often exhibit, in common infantile
diseases, the same peculiar symptoms. My father mentioned
to me the case of four brothers who died between the ages of
sixty and seventy, in the same highly peculiar comatose state.
All instance has already been given of supernumerary digits
appearing in four children out of six in a previously unaftected
family. Dr. Devay states that two brothers married two
sisters, their first-cousins, none of the four nor any relation
being an albino ; but the seven children produced from this
double marriage were all perfect albinoes. Some of these
cases, as Mr. Sedgwick has shown, are probably the result
of reversion to a remote ancestor, of whom no record liad been
preserved ; and all these cases are so far directly connected
with inheritance that no doubt the children inherited a
similar constitution from their parents, and, from being
exposed to nearly similar conditions of life, it is not surpris-
ing that they should be affected in the same manner and at
the same period of life.
Most of the facts hitherto given have served to illustrate
the force of inheritance, but we must now consider cases
grouped as well as the subject allows into classes, shoxving
how feeble, capiicious, or deficient the power of inheritance
sometimes is. When a new peculiarity first ai)pears, we can
never pr edict whether it will be inherited. If both parents
from their birth present the same peculiarity, the probability
is strong that it will be traiif-niitted to at least some of their-
offspring. We have seen that variegation is transmitted
much moi-e feebly by seed, taken from a branch which had
become variegated thr ough bud- variation, than from plants
which were variegated as seedlings. With most plants tlie
power of transmission notoriously depends on some uinate
35 ‘ Du Danger des Manages Con- Chirurg. Review,’ July, 1863, pp.
saiiguins,’ 2nd edit., 1862, p. 103. 183, 189.
35 ‘ British and Foreign Medico-
Chap. XIL
INHERITANCE.
461
capacity in the individual: thus Vilmorin raised from a
peculiarly coloured balsam some seedlings, which all resembled
their parent ; but of these seedlings some failed to transmit
tl.e new character, whilst others transmitted it to all their
descendants during several successive generations. So again
with a variety of the rose, two plants alone out of six weie
found by Vilmorin to be capable of transmitting the desired
character; numerous analogous cases could be given.
The weeping or pendulous growth of trees is strongly inherited
in some cases, and, without any assignable reason, feebly in other
cases. I have selected this character as an instance of capricious
inheritance, because it is certainly not proper to the parent- species,
and because, both sexes being borne on the same tree, both tend to
transmit the same character. Even supposing that there may have
been in some instances crossing with adjoining trees of the same
species, it is not probable that all the seedlings would have been
thus affected. At Moccas Court there is a famous weeping oak ;
many of its branches are 30 feet long, and no thicker in any part
of this length than a common rope this tree transmits its weeping
character, in a greater or less degree, to all its seedlings ; some of
the young oaks being so flexible that they have to be supported by
props ; otliers not showing the weeping tendency till about twenty
years old.^® Mr. Elvers fertilized, as he informs me, the flowers of
a new Belgian weeping thorn (Cratceyus oxyacantha) with pollen
from a crimson not- weeping variety, and three young trees, “ now
six or seven years old, show a decided tendency to be pendulous,
but as yet are not so much so as the mother-plant.” According to
Mr. MacNab,^^ seedlings from a magnificent weeping birch (Betula
alba), in the Botanic Garden at Edinburgh, grew for the first ten or
fifteen years upright, but then all became weepers like their parent.
A peach with pendulous branches, like those of the weeping willow,
has been found capable of propagation by seed.^° Lastly, a weeping
or rather a prostrate yew ( Taxus baccata) was found in a hedge in
Shropshire ; it was a male, but one branch bore female flowers, and
produced berries ; these, being sown, produced seventeen trees all
of which had exactly the same peculiar habit with the parent-
tree.^^
These facts, it might have been thought, would have been sufficient
Verlot, ‘La Product, des Varie-
tes,’ 1865, p. 32.
Loudon’s ‘ Gard. Mag.,’ vol. xh.,
1836, p. 368.
Verlot, ‘ La Product, des Varie-
U§; 1865, p. 94.
■'® Bronn’s ‘ Geschichte der Natur,’
b. li. s. 121, Mr. Mechau makes a
similar statement in ‘ Proc. Nat. of
Philadelphia,’ 1872, p. 235.
KeA^ W. A. Leighton, ‘ Flora of
Shropshire,’ p. 497 ; and Charles-
worth’s ‘Mag. of Nat. Hist.,’ vol. i.,
1837, p. 30. I possess prostrate trees
j»roduced from these seeds.
4G2
INHERITANCE.
Chap. XII
to render it probable that a pendulous liabit would in all cases be
strictly inherited. But let us look to the other side. Mr. MaeXab'^^
sowed seeds (d‘ the weeping beech {Fugus sylvatica), but succeeded
ill raising only common beeches. Mr. Rivers, at my request, raised
a number of seedlings from throe distinct varieties of weeping elm ;
and at least one of the parent-trees was so situated that it could not
have been crossed by any other elm ; but none of the young trees,
now about a foot or two in height, show the least signs of weeping,
IMr. Eivers formerly sowed above twenty thousand seeds of the
weeping ash. (Fraxmtis excelsior), and not a single seedling was in
the least degree pendulous ; in Germany, M. Borchmeyer raised a
thousand seedlings, with the same result. Nevertheless, Mr. Ander-
son, of the Chelsea Botanic Garden, by sowing seed from a weeping-
ash, which was found before the year 1780, in Cambridgeshire,
raised several pendulous trees.^^ Professor Henslow also informs
me that some seedlings from a female weeping ash in the Botanic
Garden at Cambridge were at first a little pendulous, but afterwards
became quite upright: it is probable that this latter tree, which
transmits to a certain extent its pendulous habit, was derived l)y a
bad from the same original Cambridgeshire stock; whilst other
weeping ashes may have had a distinct origin. But the crowning-
case, communicated to me by Mr. Eivers, which shows how
capricious is the inheritance of a pendulous habit, is that a variety
of another species of ash {F. lentiscifolia), now about twenty years
old, which was formerly pendulous, “ has long lost this habit, every
“ shoot being remarkably erect ; but seedlings formerly raised from
“ it were perfectly prostrate, the stems not rising more than tw^o
‘‘ inches above the ground.” Thus the weeping variety of the common
ash, which has been extensively propagated by buds during- a long
period, did not with Mr. Eivers, transmit its character to one seed-
ling out of above twenty thousand ; whereas the weeping variedy of
a second species of ash, which could not, whilst grown in the same
garden, retain its own weeping character, transmitted to its character
the pendulous habit in excess !
Many analogous facts could be given, showing how apparently
capricious is the principle of inheritance. All the seedlings from a
variety of the Barberry (i?. vulgaris) with red leaves inherited the
same character ; only about one-third of the seedlings of the copper
Beech {Fag us sylvatica) had purple leaves. Not one out of a hundred
seedlings of a variety of the Cerasuspadus, with yellow fruit, bore yel low
fruit : one-twelfth of the seedlings of the variety of Cornus mo.scida^
with yellow fruit, came true : and lastly, all the trees raised by my
father from a yellow-berried holly {Ilex uquifolium), found wild,
Veilot, op. cit., p. 93.
For these several statements, see
Loudon’s ‘ Card. .Magazine, vol. x.
1834, ]ip. 40S, 180 ; and vol. ix.,
1833, p. 597.
These statements are taken from
De Candolle, ‘ Bot. Goograplu,
p. 1083.
UlJAl . XII
INHERITANCE.
4G3
produced yellow berries. Vilmorin observed in a bed of Saponaria
calahrica an extremely dwarf variety, and raised from it a large
number of seedlings ; some of these partially resembled their parent,
and he selected their seed ; but the grandchildren were not in the
least dwarfed : on the other hand, he observed a stunted and bushy
variety of Tagetes signata growing in the midst of the common
varieties by which it was probably crossed ; for most of the seedlings
raised from this plant were intermediate in character, ouly two
perfectly resembling their parent ; but seed saved from these two
plants reproduced the new variety so truly, that hardly any selection
has since been necessary.
Flowers transmit their colour truly, or most capriciously. Many
annuals come true : thus I purchased German seeds of thirty -four
named sub- varieties of one race of ten- week stocks (^Matthiold
annua), and raised a hundred and forty plants, all of which, with
the exception of a single plant, came true. In saying this, however,
it must be understood that I could distinguish only t’srenty kinds
out of the thirty-four named sub-A’^arieties ; nor did the colonr of
the flower always correspond Avith the name affixed to the packet ;
but I say that they came true, because in each of the thirty-six
short roAA^s every plant was absolutely alike, with the one single
exception. Again, I procured packets of German seed of tAventy-
five named A^arieties of common and quilled asters, and raised a
hundred and tAventy-four plants ; of these, all except ten were true
in the above limited sense ; and I considered even a Avrong shade of
colour as false.
It is a singular circumstance that Avhite varieties generally
transmit their colour much more truly than any other variety.
This fact probably stands in close relation with one observed by
Verlot,^® namely, that flowers which are normally white rarely vary
into any other colour. I have found that the white varieties of
J)elphinium coruiolida^ and of the Stock are the truest. It is, indeed,
sufficient to look through a nurseryman s seed-list, to see the large
number of Avhite varieties Avhich can be propagated by seed. The
several coloured varieties of the SAveet-pea {Lathy r us odoratus) are
very true ; but I hear from Mr. Masters, of Canterbury, who has
particularly attended to this plant, that the white variety is the
truest. The hyacinth, when propagated by seed, is extremely
inconstant in colour, but “ Avhite hyacinths almost always give by
seed white-floAA^ered plants and Mr. Masters informs me
that the yelloAv varieties also reproduce^ their colour, but of different
shades. On the other hand, pink and blue varieties, the latter being
the natural colour, are not nearly so true : hence, as Mr. Masters has
remarked to me, ‘‘ Ave see that a garden variety may acquire a more
permanent habit than a natural species ; ” but it should have been
added, that this occurs under cultivation, and therefore under
changed conditions.
Alph.' De Candolle, ‘ Gdogiaph.
Bot.,’ p. 1082.
V'erlot, op. cit., p. 38.
Op. cit., p. 59.
404 INHERITANCE. Chap. Xll
Witli many flowers, especially perennials, nothin" can be more
fluctuating than the colour of the seedlings, as is notoriously the
case with verbenas, carnations, dahlias, cinerarias, and others."*® I
sowed seed of twelve named varieties of Snapdragon {Antirrhinum
majas), and utter confusion was the result. In most cases the
extremely fluctuating colour of seedling plants is probably in chief
part due to crosses between differentiy-coloured varieties during
previous generations. It is almost certain that this is the case with
the polyanthus and coloured primrose {Fririiida veris and vaUjarifi),
from their reciprocally dimorphic structure; and these are plants
which florists speak of as never coming true by seed : but if care be
taken to prevent crossing, neither species is by any means very
inconstant in colour; thus I raised twenty-three plants from a
purple primrose, fertilised by Mr. J. Scott with its pollen, and
eighteen came up purple of ditferent shades, and only five reverted
to the ordinary yellow colour: again, I raised twenty plants from a
bright-red cowslip, similarly treated by Mr. Scott, and every one
perfectly resembled its parent in colour, as likewise did, with the
exception of a single plant, 72 grandchildren. Even with the
most variable flowers, it is probable that each delicate shade of
colour might be permanently fixed so as to be transmitted by seed,
by cultivation in the same soil, by long-continued selection, and
especially by the prevention of crosses. I infer this from certain
annual larkspurs {Del'phirdum consoUda and ajacis), of which common
seedlings present a greater diversity of colour than any other plant
known to me ; yet on procuring seed of five named German varieties
of D. consoUda, only nine plants out of ninety-four were false ; and
the seedlings of six varieties of D. ajacis were true in the same
manner and degree as with the stocks above described. A dis-
tinguished botanist maintains that the annual species of Delphinium
are always self-fertilised ; therefore I may mention that thirty-twc
flowers on a branch of D. consoUda, enclosed in a net, yielded twenty-
seven capsules, with an average of 17’2 seed in each ; whilst five
flowers, under the same net, which were artificially fertilised, in the
same manner as must be effected by bees during their incessant
visits, yielded five capsules with an average of 35-2 fine seed ; and
this shows that tlie agency of insects is necessary for the full
fertility of this plant. Analogous facts could be given with respect
to the crossing of many other flowers, such as carnations, &c., of
wl ich the varieties fluctuate much in colour.
As with flowers, so with our domesticated animals, no character is
more variable than colour, and probably in no animal more so than
with the horse. Yet, with a little care in breeding, it appears that
races of any colour might soon be formed. Hofacker gives the result
of matching two hundred and sixteen mares of four different colours
See ‘Cottage Gardener,’ April Darwin, in ‘Journal of Proc.
XO, 1860, p. 18, and Sept. 10, 1861, Linn. Soc. Bot.’ 1862, p. 04.
p. 456* ‘Card. Chron.,’ 1845, p. 102.
f
Chap. XII.
INHERITANCE.
465
with like-coloured stallions, without regard to the colour of their
ancestors ; and of the two hundred and sixteen colts born, eleven
alone failed to inherit the colour of their parents : Autenrieth and
Ammon assert that, after two generations, colts of a uniform colour
are produced with certainty.
In a few rare cases peculiarities fail to be inherited, appa-
rently from the force of inheritance being too strong. I
have been assured by breeders of the canary-bird that to get
a good jonquil-coloured bird it does not answer to pair two
jonquils, as the colour then comes out too strong, or is even
bro\^‘n ; but this statement is disputed by other breeders. So
again, if two crested canaries are paired, the young birds
rarely inherit this character : for in crested birds a narrow
space of bare skin is left on the back of the head, where the
feathers are up-turned to form the crest, and, when both
parents are thus characterised, the bareness becomes exces-
sive, and the crest itself fails to be developed. Mr. Hewitt,
speaking of Laced Sebright Bantams, says that, “ why this
should be so I know not, but I am confident that those that
are best laced frequently produce offspring very far from
perfect in their markings, whilst those exhibited by myself,
which have so often proved successful, were bred from the
union of heavily-laced birds with those that were scarcely
sufficiently laced.”
It is a singular fact that, although several deaf-mutes often
occur in the same family, and though their cousins and other
relations are often in the same condition, yet their parents are
rarely deaf-mutes. To give a single instance ; not one scholar
out of 148, who were at the same time in the London Institu-
tion, was the child of parents similarly affected. So again,
when a male or female deaf-mute marries a sound person,
their children are most rarely. affected ; in Ireland, out of 203
children thus produced one alone was mute. Even when
both parents have been deaf-mutes, as in the case of forty-one
marriages in the United States and of six in Ireland, only
Hofacker, ‘ Ueber die Eigen- that he believes that these statements
schaften,’ &c., s. 10. are correct.
Bechstein, ‘Naturgesch.Deutsch- ‘The Poultry Book,’ by W. B.
lands,’ b. iv. s. 462. Mr. Brent, a Tegetmeier, 1866, p. 245.
great breeder of canaries, informs me
31
466
INHERITANOK.
Cjiap. XU
two deaf and dumb children were produced. Mr. Sedgwick,
in commenting on this remarkable and fortunate failure in
the power of transmission in the direct line, remarks that it
juay possibly bo owing to “ excess having reversed the action
of some natural law in development.” But it is safer in the
present state of our knowledge to look at the whole case as
simply unintelligible.
Although many congenital monstrosities are inherited, of
which examples have already been given, and to which may
be added the lately recorded case of the transmission during
a century of hare-lip with a cleft-palate in the writer’s own
family,^^ yet other malformations are rarely or never inherited.
Of these latter cases, many are probably due to injuries in
the womb or egg, and would come under the head of non-
inherited injuries or mutilations. With plants, a long cata-
logue of inherited monstrosities of the most serious and
diversified nature could easily be given ; and with plants,
there is no reason to suppose that monstrosities are caused
by direct injuries to the seed or embryo.
With respect to the inheritance of structures mutilated by
injuries or altered by disease, it was until lately difficult to
come to any definite conclusion. Some mutilations have been
practised for a vast number of generations without any in-
herited result. Godron remarks that different races of man
have from time immemorial knocked out their upper incisors,
cut off joints of their fingers, made holes of immense size
through the lobes of their ears or through their nostrils,
tatooed themselves, made deep gashes in various parts of their
bodies, and there is no reason to suppose that these mutila-
tions have ever been inherited.^® Adhesions due to in-
‘ British and Foreign Med.-
Chirurg. Review,’ July, 1861, pf.
200-204. Mr. Sedgwick has given
such fr.ll details on this subject, with
ample references, that I need refer
to no other authorities.
Mr. Sproule, in ‘ British Medical
Journal,’ April 18, 1863.
” ‘ De I’Espbce,’ tom. ii., 1859, p.
299.
Nevertheless Mr.Wetherell states,
‘Nature,’ Dec. 1870, p. 168, that
when he visited fifteen years ago the
Sioux Indians, he was informed “ by
a physician, who has passed much of
his time with these tribes, that some-
times a child was born with these
marks. This was confirmed by the
IJ. S. Government Indian Agent.”
Chap. XII.
INHEKITANCE.
467
flammation and pits from the small - pox (and formerly
many consecutive generations must have been thus pitted)
are not inherited. With respect to Jews, I have been assured
by three medical men of the Jewish faith that circumcision,
which has been practised for so many ages, has produced no
inherited effect. Blumenbach, however, asserts that Jews
are often born in Germany in a condition rendering circum-
cision difficult, so that a name is given them signifying born
circumcised ; ” and Professor Preyer informs me that this is
the case in Bonn, such children being considered the special
favourites of Jehovah. I have also heard from Dr. A. Newman,
of Guy’s Hospital, of the grandson of a circumcised Jew, the
father not having been circumcised, in a similar condition. But
it is possible that all these cases may be accidental coincidences,
for Sir J. Paget has seen five sons of a lady and one son of
her sister with adherent prepuces ; and one of these boys was
affected in a manner “ which might be considered like that
commonly produced by circumcision;” yet there was no
suspicion of Jewish blood in the family of these two sisters.
Circumcision is practised by Mahomedans, but at a much
later age than by Jews ; and Dr. Eiedel, Assistant Resident
in North Celebes, writes to me that the boys there go naked
until from six to ten years old ; and he has observed that
many of them, though not all, have their prepuces much
reduced in length, and this he attributes to the inherited
effects of the operation. In the vegetable kingdom oaks and
other trees have borne galls from primeval times, yet they
do not produce inherited excrescences ; and many other such
facts could be adduced.
Notwithstanding the above several negative cases, we
now possess conclusive evidence that the.effects of operations
are sometimes inherited. Dr. Brown-Sequard gives the
following summary of his observations on guinea-pigs ; and
this summary is so important that I will quote the whole ; —
‘Philosoph. Mag.’ vol. iv., 1799,
p. 5.
‘ Proc. Royal Soc.,’ vol. x. p.
297. ‘ Communication to the Brit.
Assoc 1870. ‘ The Lancet,’ Jan.
1875, p. 7. The extracts are from
this last paper. It appears that
Obersteiner, ‘ Strieker’s Med. Jahr*
bticher,’ 1875, No. 2, has confirmea
Brown-Sequard’s observati ms
468
INHERITANCE.
Chap. XIL
“ 1st. Appearance of epilepsy in animals born ol parents having
beim rendered epileptic by an injury to the spinal cord.
2nd. Appearance of epilepsy also in animals born of parents
having been rendered epileptic by the section of the sciatic nerve.
“ 3ri A change in the shape of the ear in animals boi-n of parents
in which such a change was the effect of a division of the cervical
sympathetic nerve.
‘'4th. Partial closure of the eyelids in animals born of parents in
wliich that state of the eyelids had been caused either by the
section of the cervical sympathetic nerve or the removal of tho
superior cervical ganglion.
“ 5th. Exophthalmia in animals born of parents in which an injury
to the restiform body had produced that protrusion of the eyeball.
This interesting fact I have witnessed a good many times, and I
have seen the transmission of the morbid state of the eye continue
through four generations. In these animals, modified by heredity,
the two eyes generally xjrotruded, although in the parents usually
only one showed exophthalmia, the lesion having been made in most
cases only on one of the corpora restiformia.
“ 6th. Hoematoma and dry gangrene of the eara in animals born of
parents in which these ear- alterations had been caused by an injury
to the restiform body near the nib of the calamus.
“ 7th. Absence of two toes out of the three of the hind leg, and
sometimes of the three, in animals whose parents had eaten up their
hind- leg toes which had become ansesthetic from a section of the
sciatic nerve alone, or of that nerve and also of the crural. Some-
times, instead of complete absence of the toes, only a part of one or
two or three was missing in the young, although in the parent not
only the toes but the whole foot was absent (partly eaten off, partly
destroyed by inflammation, ulceration, or gangrene).
“ 8th. Appearance of various morbid states of the skin and hair of
the neck and face in animals born of parents having had similar
alterations in the same parts, as effects of an injury to the sciatic
nerve.’"
It should be especially observed that Brown-Sequard has
bred during thirty years many thousand guinea-pigs from
animals which had not been operated upon, and not one of
these manifested the epileptic tendency. Nor has lie ever
seen a guinea-pig born without toes, which was not the
offspring of parents which had gnawed off their own toes
owing to the sciatic nerve having been divided. Of this
latter fact thirteen instances were carefully recorded, and a
greater number were seen; yet Brown-Sequard speaks of
such cases as one of the rarer forms of inheritance. It is a
still more interesting fact —
Chap. XII.
INHERITANCE.
469
“That the sciatic nerve in the congenitally toeless animal has
inherited the power of passing through all the different morbid states
which have occurred in one of its parents from the time of the division
till after its reunion with the peripheric end. It is not therefore
simply the power of performing an action which is inherited, but
the power of performing a whole series of actions, in a certain order.”
In most of the cases of inheritance recorded by Brown-Se-
quard only one of the t’wo parents had been operated upon
and was affected. He concludes by expressing his belief that
“ what is transmitted is the morbid state of the nervous
system,” due to the operation performed on the parents.
With the lower animals Dr. Proper Lucas has collected a
long list of inherited injuries. A few instances will suffice.
A cow lost a horn from an accident with consequent suppur-
ation, and she produced three calves which were hornless on
the same side of the head. With the horse, there seems
hardly a doubt that exostoses on the legs, caused by too
much travelling on hard roads, are inherited. Blumen-
bach records the case of a man who had his little finger on
the right hand almost cut off, and wffiich in consequence
grew crooked, and his sons had the same finger on the same
hand similarly crooked. A soldier, fifteen years before his
marriage, lost his left eye from purulent ophthalmia, and his
two sons were microphthalmic on the same side.^® In all
cases in which a parent has had an organ injured on one
side, and two or more of the offspring are born with the
same organ affected on the same side, the chances against
mere coincidence are almost infinitely great. Even when
only a single child is born having exactly the same part of
the body afiected as that of his injured parent, the chances
against coincidence are great ; and Professor Eolleston has
given me twm such cases which have fallen under his own
observation, — namely of two men, one of whom had his knee
and the other his cheek severely cut, and both had children
This last case is quoted by Mr.
Sedgwick in ‘ British and Foreign
Medico-Chirurg. Review,’ April, 1861,
p. 484. For Blumenbach, see above-
cited paper. See, also, -Dr. P. Lncas,
‘Traite de I’Hered. Nat.,’ tom. ii. p.
492. Also, ‘ Transact. Linn. Soc.,’ vol.
IX. p. 323. Some curious cases are
given by Mr. Baker in the ‘Veterinary,’
vol. xiii. p. 723. Another curious
case is given in the ‘Annales des
Scienc. Nat.,’ 1st series, tom. xi. p.
324.
470
INHERITANCE.
Chap. XII
born with exactly the same spot marked or scarred. Many
instances have been recorded of cats, dogs, and hofses, which
have had their tails, legs, &c., amputated or injured, produc-
ing offspring with the same parts ill-formed ; but as it is not
very rare for similar malformations to appear spontaneously,
all such cases may be due to coincidence. It is, however, an
argument on the other side that “ under the old excise laws
“ the shepherd-dog was only exempt from tax when without
“ a tail, and for this reason it was always removed ; ” and
there still exist breeds of the shepherd-dog which are always
born destitute of a tail. Finally, it must be admitted, more
especially since the publication of Brown-Sequard’s observa-
tions, that the effects of injuries, especially when followed by
disease, or perhaps exclusively when thus followed, are
occasionally inherited.®^
Causes of Non-inheritance.
A large number of cases of non-inheritance are intelligible
on the principle, that a strong tendency to inheritance does
exist, but that it is overborne by hostile or unfavourable
conditions of life. No (me would expect that our improved
pigs, if forced during several generations to travel about and
root in the ground for their own subsistence, would transmit,
as truly as they now do their short muzzles and legs, and
their tendency to fatten. Dray-horses assuredly would not
long transmit their great size and massive limbs, if compelled
to live on a cold, damp mountainous region ; we have indeed
evidence of such deterioration in the horses which have run
wild on the Falkland Islands. European dogs in India often
fail to transmit their true character. Our sheep in tropical
countries lose their wool in a few generations. There seems
also to be a close relation between certain peculiar pastures
and the inheritance of an enlarged tail in fat- tailed sheep.
'60 ‘The Dog,’ by Stonehenge, 1867,
p. 118.
The Mot-mot habitually bites
the barbs off the middle part of the
two central tail-feathei*s, and as the
barbs are congenitally somewhat
reduced on the same part of these
feathers, it seems extremely probable,
as Mr. Salvin remarks (‘ Proc. Zoolog.
Soc.’ 1873, p. 429), that this is due to
the inherited ellbcts of long-continued
mutilation.
Chap. XIL
NON-INHERITANCE.
471
which form one of the most ancient breeds in the world.
With plants, we have seen that tropical varieties of maize
lose their proper character in the course of two or three
generations, when cultivated in Europe ; and conversely so
it is with European varieties cultivated in Brazil. Our
cabbages, which here come so true by seed, cannot form heads
in hot countries. According to Carriere,^^ the purple-leafed
beech and barberry transmit their character by seed far less
truly in certain districts than in others, ynder changed
circumstances, periodical habits of life soon fail to be trans-
mitted, as the period of maturity in summer and winter
wheat, barley, and vetches. So it is with animals : for
instance, a person, whose statement I can trust, procured eggs
of Aylesbury ducks from that t.own, where they are kept in
houses and are reared as early as possible for the London
market ; the ducks bred from these eggs in a distant part of
England, hatched their first brood on January 24th, whilst
common ducks, kept in the same yard and treated in the
same manner, did not hatch till the end of March ; and this
shows that the period of hatching was inherited. But the
grandchildren of these Aylesbury ducks completely lost their
habit of early incubation, and hatched their eggs at the
same time with the common ducks of the same place.
Many cases of non-inheritance apparently result from the
conditions of life continually inducing fresh variability. We
have seen that when the seeds of pears, plums, apples, &c.,
are sown, the seedlings generally inherit some degree of
family likeness. Mingled with these seedlings, a few, and
sometimes many, worthless, wild-looking plants commonly
appear, and their appearance may be attributed to the prin-
ciple of reversion. But scarcely a single seedling will be
found perfectly to resemble the parent-form ; and this may
bo accounted for by constantly recurring variability induced
by the conditions of life. 1 believe in this, because it has
been observed that certain fruit-trees truly propagate their
kind whilst growing on their own roots ; but when grafted on
other stocks, and by this process their natural state is mani-
festly affected, they produce seedlings which vary greatly,
‘ Production et Fixation des Varietes,’ 18G5, p. 72.
472
INHERITANCE.
Chap. XII,
departing from the parental type in many cliaracters.^^^
Metzger, as stated in the ninth chapter, found that certain
kinds of wheat brought from Spain and cultivated in
Germany, failed during many years to reproduce themselves
truly ; but at last, when accustomed to their new conditions,
tiiey ceased to be variable, — that is, they became amenable
to the power of inheritance. Nearly all the plants which
cannot be propagated with any approach to certainty by seed,
are kinds which have been long propagated by buds, cuttings,
otfsets, tubers, &c., and have in consequence been frequently
exposed during what may be called their individual lives to
widely diversified conditions of life. Plants thus propagated
become so variable, that they are subject, as we have seen in
the last chapter, even to bud-variation. Our domesticated
animals, on the other hand, are not commonly exposed during
the life of the individual to such extremely diversified con-
ditions, and are not liable to such extreme variability ; there-
fore they do not lose the power of transmitting most of their
characteristic features. In the foregoing remarks on non-
inheritance, crossed breeds are of course excluded, as their
diversity mainty depends on the unequal development of
character derived from either parent or their ancestors.
Conclusion.
It has been shown in the early part of this chapter how com-
monly new characters of the most diversified nature, whether
normal or abnormal, injurious or beneficial, whether affecting
organs of the highest or most trifling importance, are in-
herited. It is often sufficient for the inheritance of some
peculiar character, that one parent alone should possess it, as
in most cases in which the rarer anomalies have been trans-
mitted. But the power of transmission is extremely variable.
In a number of individuals descended from the same parents,
and treated in the same manner, some display this power in
a perfect manner, and in some it is quite deficient ; and for
this difference no reason can be assigned. The effects of
injuries or mutilations are occasionally inherited; and we
Downing, ‘ Fruits of America,’ p. 5 : Sagcret, ‘ Pom. Phys.,’ pp. 43, 72.
Chap. XII.
INHERITANCE.
473
shall see in a future chapter that the long- continued use and
disuse of parts produces an inherited effect. Even those cha-
racters which are considered the most fluctuating, such as
colour, are with rare exceptions transmitted much more
forcibly than is generally supposed. The wonder, indeed, in
all cases is not that any character should be transmitted, but
that the power of inheritance should ever fail. The checks to
inheritance, as far as we know them, are, firstly, circumstances
hostile to the particular character in question ; secondly, con-
ditions of life incessantly inducing fresh variability ; and
lastly, the crossing of distinct varieties during some previous
generation, together with reversion or atavism — that is, the
tendency in the child to resemble its grand-parents or more
remote ancestors instead of its immediate parents. This latter
subject will be discussed in the following chapter.
END OF VOL. !<,
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Darvrln, Charles Robert
The variation of animals
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